


what a friend's got to do

by greenplasticbottle



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Bipolar Disorder, Changing POV, Comedy, Fukuroudani, I'll maybe add more tags later, M/M, Pre-Canon, Slow Build, but also mild hurt/comfort, first-year akaashi, nameless original third years, platonic bromance, second year bokuto, the whole team is mentioned, very slight mention of Kuroo/Kenma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-12
Updated: 2016-08-21
Packaged: 2018-05-19 22:29:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 22,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5982853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greenplasticbottle/pseuds/greenplasticbottle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's nice to have a buddy to text at 3am when you need to talk about a problem</p><p>A real buddy will comfort you whatever it is you're pondering about, even if it's falling for a persons face without a second thought about gender, personality or even names.</p><p>Even if it will cause headaches and a whole lot of trouble, a friend's gotta do, what a friend's gotta do</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> first attempt on writing an english fanfiction, wich is not my first language at all (so sorry in advance if anything sounds weird)
> 
> Title may change, I kinda panicked because I havn't thought of one yet. Maybe It'll make sense later on. Also I'm trying very hard to keep the characters as in-character as possible, wich includes the style of writing and describing situations depending on who's POV it is. I'm not sure if I'll succeed with that idea, but I'm gonna go with it for now

Thursday night

from: brokuto, 02:56 am  
Bro I’m so fckt!!! U have no idea how FCKT I AM

„Geez“ Kuro sighed while watching on the lit screen of his cell phone, which blinded him like a flashlight right to his eye in the darkness of his room. The digits on his display couldn’t possibly really mean it was almost 3:00 in the night, but knowing his incredibly untactful friend he figured he wasn’t hallucinating. He blinked tiredly, ran a hand through his messy hair and let out a small yawn before typing back.

to: brokuto, 03:05 am  
It’s 3 am man. What the hell happened that f*cked you so hard you couldn’t tell tomorrow?

From: brokuto, 03:06 am  
Can’t sleep!! Send help (ʘ▽ʘ)

He rolled on his back, painfully aware that this could take a while, because he knew his buddy well and he knew he wasn’t gonna shut up about a thing, anything really, if you intend to ignore it.

to: brokuto, 03:15 am  
Doesn’t answer my question. U woke me up already, so explain properly

from: brokuto, 03:16 am  
new 1st years @training today!!! this guy dude, dont even remember his name though. bt bro!! bro hes the prettiest guy ive ever seen!! cant get his beauty face out of my head u have no idea man

“What?” Kuroo asked himself out loud. He read the last message again, but wasn’t quite sure if he really got what it said.

calling brokuto...  
call accepted

„BRO!!“ the first thing Kuroo did was holding his phone at least thirty centimetres away from his ear. He kind of knew that the loud uncontrolled voice of his, which is already unmistakably loud at daytime, would be shitload skull shattering at nighttime. He figured, but almost regretted calling right away anyway. 

„Dude, indoor voice please. You’re on the telephone, not at the other side of a four-track road“   
„Ugh, Sorry“   
„I know you’re not, so what’s the matter? You fell head over heels for some first year or what the hell are you trying to tell me?“.   
Kuroo really was curious, but a bit annoyed at the same time because of the interruption of his well-deserved sleep and the still far too lour voice ringing in his ear. But a friend’s gotta do what a friend’s gotta do.

„I don’t know man. But seriously, you haven’t seen that guy. He’s straight out of a model magazine or something, I tell you!“   
„I’m pretty sure he’s just average, you tend to exaggerate when you get all excited“   
„I’m not exaggerating!!!“ Bokuto almost screamed into his phone again, not on purpose though, Kuroo was sure that he wasn’t even aware of his extra piercing volume to begin with. 

„Bo, indoor-voice!“   
„Sorry“   
„Don’t say you’re sorry when you’re not. I don’t want to start morning practice with a shitload of pain in my skull, you know? You’re glad that I’m listening to your weird confessions in the middle of the night“   
„Ugh, It’s not a confession, I’m not in love or anything! But this guy! You need to see him and you’ll understand! He’s so calm and polite and pretty, he even bowed in front of me when coach said we’re gonna practice together because he’s a setter and I apparently need some sort of calm training-partner who can handle me? I don’t know, but how in the world could I even practice with a person like that? Kuroo, I don’t even know what he said to me, I can’t remember, I tried to remember since I came home but I can’t. His damn face keeps distracting my brain cells or something“ 

Tired as he was, Kuroo probably would have dozed off again, if it wasn’t for the voice that rang in his ear, because Bokuto didn’t even breathe between his sentences and talked so fast that no one in such a tired state could’ve been able to follow „That sounds like a serious crush to me“ he simply answered without thinking too much after Bokuto seemed to be finished. 

„Shut up. What should I do? Tell me“ 

„Go to sleep“ Kuroo sighed heavily, hardly prepared for a conversation of that kind at this hour. He rubbed his tired eyes and paused for a second or two, just until he heard Bokuto drawing his breath, probably to complain. 

„Okay, listen. Just don’t panic, night owl. Ask his name first thing at morning practice. Stay calm and don’t fuck yourself over like the last time you tried to talk to that upper class girl, who was way out of your league by the way”   
“Don’t mock me about that again”   
“It’s your punishment for waking me up. Why DO we have to talk about that stuff at this hour anyway? I’m pretty sure the first years arrived at MORNING practice, right? That was like 19 goddamn hours ago, so why didn’t you text me any other time during the day?” 

“I was confused, man! His face made me ‘whoosh’ and when I got the Idea asking you it was dark outside. Somehow. I don’t know”   
Kuroos palm met his own face and he felt an urge to slap his oh so slow buddy right when they’ll meet the next time. 

“I’m going to hang up now, I’m fucking exhausted ok? Just... stop thinking so much and ask for his name. And for gods sake, don’t contact me at 3 am again“ „Got it!! Thanks man“

call ended

„I highly doubt that“ Kuroo sighed for the third time this night, turned around and got back to sleep, of course without forgetting to shut down his cell phone until morning. He feld a slight headache beginning to grow and grumbled a muffled curse into his pillow.  
‘This is gonna to be a troublesome thing’ he thought without doubt ‘This is gonna be very fucking troublesome’

*

Friday night

From: brokuto, 01:31 am  
akaashi keiji!! (QvQ)

To: brokuto, 01:46 am  
What the hell is wrong with you??

From: brokuto, 01:47 am  
Its his name!!! tha prettyboy I ws talking bout! ლ(ʘ▽ʘ)ლ

to: brokuto, 01:53 am  
Go the hell to sleep, I’m not talking to you!!

From: brokuto, 01:54 am  
kuroo, he calls me bokuto-san!! so polite!!

From: brokuto, 01:56 am  
kuroo, listen!! We practiced and his tosses are awesum!! I spked them like WHAMM and it feld so gud man

From: brokuto, 01:58 am  
Oi u listenin? why don’t u answer?? 

From: brokuto, 02:01 am  
kuroo??!1 (´’Ο∇Ο)

*

The next day at a café just around the corner of Fukurodani Highschool.   
Kuroo had a slight headache, which seemed to become a new daily struggle to him since his friend was exactly that kind of person causing it without regrets. So there was nothing more natural to him to order just a black cup of coffee and a plain melon bun for breakfast, while the cause of his headache was sitting at the other side of the table munching on far too sweet chocolate croissants and a piece of pudding pie and still manages to talk full mouthed without taking a second breath.

“But it wasn’t even 3 am!” the other whined in confusion. 

“That’s not even funny, Bo!!” 

Bokuto tilted his head to one side with incomprehension like an owl he often resembles far too much, “So, you didn’t answer cause you fell asleep?” 

“You wrote 25 massages asking me ‘are you asleep’!!”   
“So, were you?”   
“Of course I fucking was, Bo. Normal people do sleep at 2 am, you know? What the hell? Of course I shut off the phone, because I knew you wouldn’t shut up” 

“You’re cruel”   
“I’m not- ugh… you know what? Nevermind” Kuroo waved his hand to end this line of conversation and rubbed his temples in little soothing cycles with the other one. He was very lucky that today was Saturday and he was able to sleep in a little bit, otherwise he would be far more angry at his ridiculous stupid owl-friend.

“Anyway, you know. That one toss Akaashi gave me yesterday! I was able to spike it so easily, I don’t think I ever got one so easily, even coach was impressed”   
“I know, I know, you already told me. I feel like I’ve heard about prettyboy a million times by now, and you just met the day before yesterday. Would you never calm down?”

“I’m perfectly calm”   
“You have bags under your eyes”   
“Well, I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night”   
“Oh you don’t say? That’s the opposite of what ‘calm’ means” 

Surprisingly, Bokuto remained silent to that, which was rare enough. He chewed on his upper lip and stirred his cup of coffee with his pinky after throwing in at least a million sugar cubes. Kuroo followed his movements with his gaze and wasn’t sure if he was aware of what he was doing or if he simply drifted away again and moved on his own. He seemed lost in thoughts, his mostly over-exited smile fading. “What should I do?” he asked with a dazed voice.

“How do I know?” Kuroo answered, sipping at his black coffee without a single cube of sugar and doing his best not to sound too harsh, cause all the midnight texts aside, he kind of felt sad for the guys situation “It’s not like I know a whole lot about having a huge crush on ones setter” 

A pair of knowing amber eyes met Kuroos gaze and he suddenly felt a little bit awkward himself, clearing his throat before the other could get a chance to say anything “I mean, we’re not talking about me here, so stop staring at me like that. You don’t know a lot about prettyboy, right? So how about you try to get to know him better? Maybe he has an awful character and you’ll forget about his face in no time”.   
Kuroo tried to sound comforting and decided to add a little something, so this ridiculous goofball stops acting rejected without any reason. “You know, not everyone has a beautiful face AND an amazing character like we do”. 

Luckily, Bokuto was simple-minded enough to be laughing at that without a second passing and his wide grin came back as fast as it faded and he nodded, hammering a far too brutal clap on Kuroos shoulder in approval. He got used to it a while ago and just grinned back instead of paying attention to the slight ache in his shoulder. 

“And besides, you should introduce him to me soon. Because I’m still pretty sure he can’t be even close to as beautiful as you try to make me believe” Kuroo bit in his melon bun and chewed slowly, because he wasn’t particularly hungry, eating something along with the coffee was kind of just a habit.   
Bokuto already finished his meal and took the first gulp of the diabetes-coffee, visibly wrinkled his nose to the sweet and stared at the dark liquid in confusion. It made Kuroo giggle slightly in his bun.

“We do start practice early this afternoon, so if you wanna check” Bokuto said a moment later, after abandoning his unexplainably bewitched coffee. That sounded not so bad, because Kuroo was getting very curious. He knew the guy with his weird habits and mood swings for quite a while now and he surely makes friends with everyone awfully fast, but he never heard him talk about one person in particular in such high tones. 

“I’ll need to rush to practice too afterwards, but I guess I can stand a little scolding from the old man for coming late if that means I can have a peek at my bros beautiful angel-crushes handsome face”   
“Don’t say that” Bokuto pouts and his ears flush in a shiny pink, which reminded Kuroo of how much fun it is to tease this owl. 

“Sooo, by the way. You stayed awake for almost two days and nights because of him, huh? Is there anything in particular you want do DO to this beautiful face of his, you pervy owl?” 

“What?? No, I don’t! I haven’t thought about anything like that at all!!” The pink on his ears spread over his cheeks and neck and because his answer came so hastily it wasn’t convincing at all, the opposite in fact. Kuroo chuckled and leaned over the table to say the next words in a very slow and teasing way he knows Bokuto hates a lot. “Oh yes you dooo” 

The following minutes, there was nothing but teasing and chuckling mixed with complaints and flushed ears, followed by more teasing and complaining and finally ended when the waitress politely asking both of them to please be more quiet.

It eventually became early afternoon quite soon, since their ‘breakfast’ at the Café was at no time you could still call morning, so Kuroo ended up following Bokuto to the Fukurodani gym. It wasn’t the first time seeing it at all, but somehow it felt different today. Although Bokuto was much more of an unstoppable twitchy mess and even more hyper than he normally was (maybe because of all the sugar for breakfast), even Kuroo was a little bit exited to see this pretty boy. There was no way someone who ‘comes straight out of a model magazine’ could be attending a volleyball club, but who knows. There must be a proper reason for Bokuto to get his head and heart turned around like this, because aside from being an affectionate and physical type towards his friends, he wasn’t someone to actually fall in love easily at all. Especially just from looking at someone’s face, a guy’s face, for calling out loud.

“Kuroo, long time no see” Konoha was the first who waved at Kuroo, a surprised smile on his lips “What gives us the honor of your visit?” 

“Your unstoppable-ace-spiker Bokuto-senpai does”   
“Did he give you money to call him that?” Konoha laughed while Bokuto snorted noisy at his sarcastic laugh just before wandering off to enter the volleyball club room, leaving Kuroo on his own since Akaashi hasn’t arrived yet anyway. Kuroo smirked, then turned to Konoha again and shrugged his shoulders.

“Nah, just figured he wants to hear it”   
“I guess. It’s not that much of a lie, actually. I will never ever say this to his face and you also shouldn’t by the way, but he might become the new Ace this season, since his enthusiasm is almost annoying and the third years are too tired to stop him anymore, haha.” Konoka explained while they walked next to each other “On the other hand, he really IS cut out to become an ace, if not for his... you know, character” 

“He sure is a handful, huh?“   
“You know him. Me and the other second years don’t mind, it’s not like we knew him any other way. But especially our captain and setter are bothered by his downs, you know”

“Yeah, I figured” Kuroo gave Konoha a small almost apologetic smile, simply because he knew exactly what he was talking about. Bokuto sure was a handful to handle, as a friend as much as on the court. He wasn’t entirely sure if Nekoma would be able to handle a wing spiker like him in an official match at all, so he always felt just a little adoration for the patience of Fukurodanis club members. 

“He actually told me you have a new first year setter who is able to keep up with him? Couldn’t resist to take a look”. He decided to be honest about that, of course without telling anything about his true reasons. 

“Oh, he did? Ah well, I’m kinda irritated they get along that well, there can’t be two types of guys who are further apart in characters than they are” 

“Maybe that’s the reason exactly?” 

Konoha shrugged his shoulders, openly unable to tell if that’s a valid explanation “So in fact you wanna spy out your rivals new skills?” 

“Maybe. You’ll never know” Kuroo grinned and they both entered the gym, where Bokuto already changed and started to run off his far-too-much energy. 

“Well, I guess I haven’t seen you around then. Just try to vanish before the coach sees you. I don’t think he’ll like spying stray cats very much” Konoha chuckles, following his wannabe-ace’s ridiculous energetic movements with his eyes “Where the hell does his energy even come from? I can’t help but think he is some kind of bottomless bit of muscle and nuclear power” 

“Who knows? Maybe he fell in a kettle with magic potion when he was a kid” Kuroo grinned “And don’t worry, I’ll be gone in no time”   
“Good. I’ll go change then. Do me a favor and supervise the horned owl for me, so he won’t break anyone’s bones with not looking where he aims his superpowers, will you?” 

“Sure”   
Kuroo crossed his arms at the back of his neck and leaned against the wall right next to the entrance. Not a lot of people arrived by now, mainly because there were still 20 Minutes left before they’ll start training. The only people present were Konoha, Komi, Bokuto and their 3rd year setter, who looked almost anxious whilst watching their problematic wing spiker screaming his ‘HeyHeyHey’s all over the gym to motivate himself even more. Kuroo shook his head with a chuckle, he and Bokuto already trained together for a few times and he knew of his intimidating amount of energy and power, but seeing him run like crazy just to warm-up after a night with a huge lack of sleep and an even greater confusion about whatever it is he’s thinking was almost unbelievable. 

Once he stopped running a few minutes later with a high-pitches squeak of his shoes, his face suddenly lightened up with an overall happy impression. 

“Akaaaashi!”

Kuroo almost didn’t realize that the person who he just called out to came through the entrance right next to him. 

“Good afternoon, Bokuto-san” a calm and gentle voice answered and Kuroo had to admit that this voice was almost soothing just on its own.   
The person at the door was tall, not as tall as either of them, but at least taller than the other 2nd years of his team. He already changed in his trainings clothes and Kuroo couldn’t help but notice some quite athletic arms and legs. On top of that he had short wavy black hair, grey eyes and ridiculous long eyelashes and every assumption about Bokutos love-sick blindness was smashed with one single look at his face.

In a blink of an eye Bokuto stood right in front of his junior and gestured with great motions. “Akaashiiii!! I wanna introduce someone” for the second time today Bokuto hammered his palm on Kuroos sore shoulder and grinned like he won a nobel price “Kuroo Tetsurou, middle blocker from Nekoma High and my awesome best buddy!! He’s amazing, you should see him play some day!”. 

Akaashi didn’t seem to be even close to as exited as his senior was, but bowed his head anyway. “Nice to meet you, Kuroo-san” he said politely, but almost instantly turned his head back to Bokuto after Kuroo managed to say “Ah well, nice to meet you too”. “Bokuto-san, I thought about yesterday and I think I might have a solution to improve those straight spike you’re having trouble with. If you want to we can try it before everyone else arrives” 

“Hey hey hey, that’s awesome!! You’re amazing! Let’s try right away!” Akaashi nodded and went to help Komi assembling the volleyball-net after greeting also him with his calm and polite voice.

Bokuto turned to Kuroo with probably the widest grin Kuroo had ever seen on his face. 

“Shut up”   
“I haven’t said anything”   
“I can literally read your mind, butthead. I’ll get going now. I’m running late already, I’ll call you later. And Bo?”  
Kuroo grabbed his arm und pulled him closer so nobody could hear them. 

“You’re seriously fucked!! I mean it.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Akaashi Keiji just joined the volleyball club as a first year, but soon he noticed something being not as it should be.

One week after joining the Fukurodani volleyball club as a first year setter, Akaashi learned that his new comrades were a squad of guys you need to learn to handle, for speaking out loud. He spent a lot of time being tested and observed by the coach and manager and of course the other players, that wasn’t something to worry about or being bothered by at all. But he always was a very sharp observer himself, so there was no way he couldn’t notice a huge issue happening far too often at training.  
At the top of the team, they were some skilled third years and quite a number of second years with lots of energy to spend, two middle blockers who had impressive heights, energetic and powerful wing spikers and a calm and upright third year setter. At first Akaashi was surprised about himself being the one and only new member joining, but just a few times spent at the gym he kind of got the picture. 

The Fukurodani volleyball team was far away from being anywhere near harmonically.

To put it bluntly they simply didn’t function as a team. Their captain seemed annoyed most of the time, some others isolated themselves from their teammates as soon as they left the court, the setter’s tosses were good, but didn’t adapt to the individual spikers at all, the overall timing was off quite a lot and Akaashi never heard that much yelling and cursing inside a gym before. It also took no effort at all to see who of the members sympathized with whom. There was a huge gap between the third and second years and even after a few days Akaashi hadn’t witnessed some of them talking other than complaining or bawling. 

‘Should I quit?’ was a thing he caught himself thinking quite a few times, but didn’t leave anyway. He had the feeling that the team just lacks very few things to become a really powerful and impressive club, but he wasn’t able to pinpoint what it was, nor had the courage (or the boldness for talking big words as a newcomer) to talk his mind. ‘Just stay, for a start’ he thought as he continues observing ‘stay and find the answer’

It was a practice match with a neighboring school when something else happened for the first time he witnessed. The second year wing spiker Bokuto caught his eye since day one, not only because of his ridiculous hairstyle or his highly noticeable expressive character but because of his skills. His energy and strength were impressive to say the least and even if he literally couldn’t stop being very verbal about his own skills, not a single person dared to prove him wrong. Even so, the coach and their captain unjustifiably reproached him a lot for being too fast, too loud and too brutal with spiking without paying attention to his surroundings and it actually bothered Akaashi a lot. He sure was very loud, very fast and the force of his actions was kind of brutal, but it looked like they were blaming him for the sake of all the others who couldn’t compete with his kind of technique.

The ball hit the ground with an audible noise just then and Akaashi was suddenly brought back to reality. He looked around to find the ball rolling on the ground not even close to the net or the other teams field, because the powerful slam of the wing spiker’s hand just simply missed it and all the energy of the spike was lost. 

“Shit!” Bokuto cursed even before his feet hit the ground again. 

“What the hell are you doing, Bokuto??” 

Akaashi couldn’t really discover where it came from, but the air around their regulars was very thick all of a sudden. 

“Toss me the next time too!!” Bokuto growled and definitely lost every positive tone of his voice like somebody pulled a switch. The score was set to 20 – 16 in favor of the rivaling team, who were of course enthusiastic about the donated point. Akaashi had to admit that he didn’t pay enough attention to the actual game until then, because he was kind of busy screening and analyzing Bokutos every movement. The whistle was sharp in the air and the match continued, the mood on the other side of the net suddenly dropped a lot, which finally couldn’t slip past his attention.

“I won’t allow another mistake” their coach yelled and he could almost feel the players tense up. Something about that atmosphere wasn’t right and under normal circumstances a simple mistake like that was a completely normal thing happening while having a training match. For some reason it wasn’t just then and Akaashi had a suspicion that most of the other second years knew exactly why and were just as bothered by it, but nobody had the guts to say a word.

“Bring it!!” Bokuto yelled with energy just as the next chance for a toss appeared. As soon as the ball was in the air again, he jumped what seemed miles past the other teams blockers, it was impressive how his moves where confident and strong and almost perfect. Akaashi followed every move with his eyes, he hold his breath on instinct and for a second he thought he witnessed this kind of almost unstoppable spike every player hopes to accomplish some day. But just as Bokuto reached the highest point, Akaashi noticed that the toss wasn’t going where it should go at all. Only a second later, his hand missed it and the court went silent again. It was almost painful seeing that perfect spike go to waste. 

“Damn it!!” Bokuto stomped his feet on the ground and almost lost his balance, his face said defeat all over. The whistle sounded and the Coach called for a time-out. 

“Bokuto, what are you doing??” 

Akaashi nearly flinched when he heard the coach blaming none other than Bokuto for the miss and even more when he himself agreed to it.   
“I-Im sorry!!” Bokuto clenched his fists until his knuckles turned white and kept his gaze on the ground “I’m never gonna get it, please don’t toss to me anymore!”. 

“Come on, Bokuto. Get a fucking grip” the captain barked “Just don’t miss it next time” 

“I can’t, okay? Didn’t you just see? I’m USELESS”   
“You CAN and you will, for fucks sake. You can’t just abandon your position in the middle of the game. Pull yourself together!” Even though their captain wasn’t as tall as Bokuto was, he seemed superior in every aspect and Bokuto never looked as small before. He visibly shrank in front of his senior yelling at him and Akaashi almost thought he would start crying. 

“No no no no, I quit! Everyone else will do better in my stead” Bokuto nearly whined and squinted his eyes with frustration. The other schools team started glancing over since their voices could surely be heard even outside the gym. Everyone was irritated like Akaashi was, but it couldn’t get past his attention that the Fukurodani team itself seemed disturbingly used to this kind of situation. Finally, the captain groaned and looked at his coach before saying “You know what?? Fine. Get lost then”

Akaashis thoughts went confused when he witnessed the probably most confident person he ever met getting horribly dejected in just mere seconds. That couldn’t be a normal thing to happen, because one way or another, it just felt wrong.

“Bokuto, to the bench! Konoha, get on the field and take his position”

Akaashi watched silently how his senior walked to the bench as far away as possibly from all the other students. He walked very slowly and his body language was completely off like he was beaten in every aspect, his face defeated and full of reproach and the first year wasn’t able to believe his own eyes because that person sitting down on the bench was someone completely different from what he saw before.  
Behind his back the game continued with Konoha in Bokutos stead like nothing happened and it almost felt like he wasn’t part of it to begin with. The third years as well as the coach and manager didn’t give him any other attention.

“Not again...” Sarukui, a second year wing spiker said quietly to himself but attracted Akaashis attention anyway. 

“Excuse me, what just happened?”   
“Oh, Sorry. You haven’t seen this before, have you? We call it his ‘dejected mode’. When he becomes like this there’s no helping it, he’ll literally be useless for the rest of the day at least” He smiled apologetic and shrugged at the same time. Akaashi looked at Sarukui and the other two members on the sideline beside himself in confusion. 

“And will none of you try to talk to him? Isn’t he a regular?”   
“I guess he is” the only third year at the sideline answered “But what are we supposed to do? Babysit him every time he misses the ball? It’s damn frustrating that he has that much talent, because his mood-swings all the time are unbearable. He just wants attention, if you ask me” 

Akaashi frowned, because the sharp words left a bitter aftertaste. Of course he couldn’t possibly judge anyone after just a few day, but for some reason he was pretty sure that someone as light-hearted as Bokuto wouldn’t fake something like that just to get attention. Even if he would, there’s no reason to keep it up if obviously no one is giving him the attention he was accused to seek. Akaashi looked at the depressed shape on the bench, still wondering how it could be possible that this was supposed to be the same guy who smiled and grinned and cheered at him since he arrived like no evil of this world could cloud his mind. Now his muscular shoulders dropped, his straight strong back was crooked, his head sunken and his face buried in his palms like he seriously wanted the ground to swallow him whole. 

“He’s just plain annoying. It’s best you learn to ignore him” The third year said and Akaashi eyed him thoughtful, he was clearly annoyed and didn’t care and Akaashi instantly decided that he wouldn’t be a person he wanted to get along with. But looking at Sarukui and Washio beside him again he noticed something else, both second years looked like they felt horribly uneasy, but seemed to gulp down every protest on the tip of their tongue. It bothered him. A lot. No wonder he felt something was off with that team.

“Then I’ll go talk to him” Akaashi decided and waited politely if anyone wanted to hold him pack. Both Sarukui and Washio looked at him in confusion. 

“You’re sure about that? It’s not like we never tried to talk to him” Sarukui gave him another almost sad smile “It just never, you know, works. Like, at all. We’re happy if he returns to his normal self tomorrow” 

“I’m sorry for being rude Sarukui-san, but judging from my position, it won’t help if you just ignore him and wait for it to be over” Akaashi bowed slightly “Please allow me to try to talk to him. Maybe I’m able to do something about this”

“Oh, are you?” the third year burst out in laughter, leaving the other two no room to answer “Well go ahead then, you’ll see what it’s like talking to a 3 year old child”. Akaashi swallowed the sharp comment on the tip of his tongue and simply said “I will see for myself” before leaving the sideline of the field to approach the far back side of the gym where the air around the wing spiker was almost frozen.

“Excuse me, Bokuto-san?” Akaashi sat down beside his senior with a respectful distance “Are you alright?”

Bokuto still buried his face in his palms and didn’t make any effort to look up. For a moment Akaashi thought that he won’t answer by any means or that he was sunken in his own thoughts so much that he doesn’t realize that he was asked a question. So he started again, just to be interrupted mid-sentence. “Bokuto-san, are you—“   
“Don’t talk to me, I’m a disgrace” His voice was unexpectedly quiet and muffled on top of that and it took quite an effort to understand what he said, but Akaashi managed somehow. 

“I don’t think you are just because you missed a spike. There is no such thing as a perfect player”   
“I didn’t JUST miss ONE, I missed them all! I’m so useless, the team would be much better without me stopping them!” the second answer sounded louder and a bit more angry than the first one, even though his anger was clearly addressed to himself. The sound of it was miserable and Akaashi felt uneasy because just maybe talking to him wasn’t such a good idea for someone who was very close to a complete stranger rather than a friend. Anyway, it was too late to back up now, so he simply made sure to make his voice sound as calm and forgiving as possible. 

“What exactly makes you think that?” 

“Everything!” Bokuto whined and choked a hic-up. The fingers burying his face trembled just a little, but enough for Akaashi to notice. 

Akaashi hesitated, he kind of got the picture why nobody wanted to talk to Bokuto in that so-called ‘dejected mode’, which was a disrespectful name for it anyway. It was very difficult to get through to him and to keep up a conversation if he blocked off every effort to do so. Besides that, Akaashi proved himself true, because Bokutos sudden depression clearly wasn’t anywhere near ‘begging for attention’.

“Please listen, Bokuto-san” he started again and reduced the distance between them just a little bit. He waited for a moment until Bokuto finally lifted his head and showed his face, his nose and ears were red, his hair a mess from ruffling it out of despair and his eyes almost filled with tears. It felt somehow very wrong looking at that face, because Akaashi wasn’t able to replace the grinning happy person this guy had become in his mind with something different.

“I hope you don’t mind me being honest. But that spike just now wasn’t your fault” Akaashi explained and could see his seniors eyes already light up very slightly “Your jump there was amazing, actually. The toss was good, but not suitable for you. It was nearly impossible for you to get it and you’re not to blame” 

“You really think my spike was good?” Bokutos voice still trembled a little but suddenly was so full of hope it was almost cute “You’re not just saying that to cheer me up, are you?” 

“I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it. I really think you have an amazing talent, it’s just that you can’t win volleyball on your own. Your team must adapt to your spikes when they want them to succeed. Of course you also have to adapt to them, it’s nothing you can win one-sided” 

“So… you’re sure it wasn’t my fault?” Bokuto asked again with a still insecure voice. 

“Yes, I’m sure. I’m not the most experiences setter yet, but I believe what you need is a quite different kind of toss and I’m certain you won’t miss it then. If you want to, we can try it out when everybody else is gone. I’m tossing for you”

“Really?” 

“Yes. Really”

“That’ll be AMAZING” Bokuto jumped up from the bench so abruptly Akaashi flinched in surprise “Please toss for me, Akaashi!!”

Without the first year being able to avoid it, Bokuto crushed him with an over excessively tight hug which only lasted a second or two, but long enough for a breathless groan to escape his throat. Bokuto was back on his feet and raised both of his fists in the air to cheer an exited “Hey hey hey”. His voice back to an ear-battering sound like always and his mood-swing seemed to be gone before it even started. Not only Akaashi was mesmerized by his incredibly fast change of mood, but the whole gym went silent all at once, only Bokutos voice filled the air and everybody was staring at him and Akaashi like he just performed a world wonder .

“We’re gonna practice lots of lots of spikes, it’s gonna be awesome!! Hey hey heeeey”

*

“What… what the hell have you done??” second year libero Komi asked Akaashi a while after they finished the match. Although Bokuto was back to his good mood, neither their coach nor the captain would allow him back in the match, but happily that wasn’t reason enough for him to get depressed again. Instead Akaashi tried to explain which kind of toss and spike combo they should practice later. He was at ease again and watching the enthusiasm and energy returning in his senior’s grin made him happy too. Not only Komi, but every second year gave both of them almost jealous glances. It was only after the neighboring school’s team left and the others started to clean the gym, that one of them finally approached Akaashi.

“I haven’t done much, to be honest” he answered calmly “I only spoke honestly” 

“I don’t really know what you mean by that. Seriously, I do know this airhead since middle school and I never ever managed to change his mood like you just did”

“You make it sound like I performed some kind of miracle, Komi-san” Akaashi was a little flustered and couldn’t avoid to search Bokuto with his eyes, who just jumped around like it was the best day of his life “I didn’t do anything special”

“Sure you did!! Thank you so much” Komi patted his shoulder and gave him a wide smile “I’m certain he’s deeply grateful too, although he maybe isn’t aware of it. So let me just thank you in his stead! Maybe you’re finally someone who can handle his… um… attitude”

“I’m quite certain it’s not just an attitude. Bokuto-san doesn’t seem like a person who does this on purpose”

“Yeah, I know” Komi sighed just a little bit “Anyway, Akaashi-san. What you did today was truly awesome! And I’m not the only one thinking that” 

Automatically Akaashis gaze turned to Konoha, who mobbed the floor right next to Bokuto and just started to laugh at him, pointing at his messed up hairstyle. Sarukui also chuckled and even Washio looked far more at ease than while standing on the sideline of the match. 

“He said you’ll practice with him after all of us finished, right?” Komi continued while throwing the scattered balls back into the basket “I bet he’s very damn happy about that. As you surely noticed, his energy is endless. I stayed and tried to throw tosses one or two times, but to be honest, I suck at tossing. And I get out of energy quite fast after all this training and I can’t keep up with him.”

“It certainly is exhausting. But it’s fine by me”

“Amazing” Komis grin was even wider than before “I’ll go ask the coach for the key then. You’ll be a great team, I can almost smell it!”

‘Smell it?’ Akaashi thought just as Komi finished collecting the balls and ran to their coach to do as he said. He turned his head to the second years again. They sure were in a good mood since the match ended, even though their team lost it. Maybe it wasn’t everyone who seemed to be having trouble with one another.

*

“Who-hooooo!!! I got it! I’m the best!!!” 

Bokuto cheered so loud that it was impossible to not hear it anywhere near the gym, fortunately no one would be present at school grounds that late “Wasn’t that spike amazing, Akaashi, wasn’t it?”

“It actually was, yes” Akaashi nodded. He was right after all. Bokutos spikes were almost perfect on it’s own, it only required a quite different way of tossing. They both didn’t get used to it yet, but it was most likely the right thing to practice.

“Really? Really? Did I look cool?” Bokuto asked over and over again, as if he needed to confirm every move he made was real.   
“Yeah you did” Akaashi acknowledged again and couldn’t help but smile. Training as a team of two wasn’t that bad, he even thinks it was quite satisfying. This way both of them were able to learn from each other and even more important collaborating with one another. His arms ached from tossing what felt a hundred times, he felt sticky from sweat and he really needed a shower right now. But he also felt more alive and motivated just from watching his senior’s impressive spiking. It sure was exhausting too, but not in a bad way. 

‘It’s him’ Akkashi thought while watching Bokuto getting somewhat excited by the smile he gave to him, very obviously on top of that. ‘Bokuto is the one thing this team lacks. If they learn to handle him correctly, they’re going to be unstoppable’

“WE’re going to be” he corrected himself out lout.

“We’re going to be what?” Bokuto tilted his head to one side in confusion.

“Nothing, Bokuto-san” Akaashi smiled and chuckled internally because his senior truly obviously tried to hide how happy and excited he got once again just because he saw him smiling “Let’s call it a day”

*

from: brokuto, 2:02  
he smled at me!!!! That smile, man!! I thought I gonna melt!!

to: brokuto, 2:15  
go. to. sleep.

from:brokuto, 2:16  
can’t, Im so pumped right now!!!

to: brokuto, 2:20  
I NEED sleep, I mean it

from: brokuto, 2:21  
Ima go jogging!! C U tmorrow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so that's it for the more serious chapter. It's hard to write in Akaashis POV though, I hope I succeded somehow. Third chapter will probably take a little while, but will be more funny again!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took longer that I planned, forgive me. For some reason I had difficulties with some things in the story and where it's heading, but I think I got a grip on it now. I'm sorry if the chapter is a little boring maybe, I'm still trying and learning a lot!
> 
>  
> 
> Thank you so much for reading anyway

It was almost the end of the year when the Fukurodani volleyball team needed to make a decision.

It was about something their coach reminded them of since summer, because it wasn’t an easy thing to decide. ‘Don’t waste more time’ he had said more often than anyone could count. At that time the Team consisted of four third years and the almost ridiculous amount of ten second years with only one first year following after that. No wonder their coach was pushing their decision.

Nevertheless nothing happened for almost two whole months. Everyone seemed to have pushed the thought of it away to the back of their heads. Especially Konoha, who thought it was just an annoyance to think about it. He certainly didn’t want to be involved with leading the team in any way, so he decided to leave the discussion to someone else, anyone really, as long as he could stay out of it. What he didn’t expect was that he wasn’t the only one thinking that way.

However at one point there was no way around it, they needed to talk it out, even if it means drawing by lot. Summer was already over and it started to get grey and cold outside, the third years would leave in less than a month and even if no one in particular wanted to lead the team, none of them wanted to stop playing volleyball either.

So while their coach, managers and third years left, the rest of them stayed and sat down in a circle after practice one day and began to discuss the unpleasant topic.

“I’m honestly not so sure about that” Sarukui smiled in a polite and almost shy way “I am flattered that you even considered choosing me, but I don’t feel up to the task at all.”

“Is anyone even up to the task?” Komi leaned his back against the wall behind him and sighed in frustration, because the conversation kind of went in circles for some time “We SHOULD have talked about this much sooner. Now we only have one month left. I mean, I’m always there to back all of you up, but as a libero I can’t possibly become a team captain”

“Ugh, this is so frustrating” Konoha moaned, which seemed the only thing he was capable of saying about that topic “We NEED to decide who’s gonna be captain, or coach will just choose one without asking. And I swear, if he even thinks of choosing me, I’m gonna quit”

Konoha was in a bad mood. No wonder, because the day actually wasn’t a good one to begin with. They got into a fight with their current captain about trivial matters and their setter outright refused tossing to Bokuto at some point because he was ‘too hard to deal with’ and in the end they didn’t even finish the 3 on 3 match. Luckily Akaashi somehow managed to avoid Bokuto becoming dejected again and Konoha almost wanted to hug him for that, because a dejected Bokuto would have been the one thing to top the whole horrible mood off. Everyone seemed to be on edge for one reason or another and Konoha wanted nothing more than to get this conversation over with, hurry home, take an hot shower and bury himself in pointless video-games for the rest on the evening.

“So who would at least consider being captain?” Komi asked and looked around to meet everybody’s gaze.

“No way in hell” was Konoha’s prompt answer. Sarukui also shook his head with an apologetic smile and most of the others simply fell silent.

‘No wonder’ Konoha thought to himself again, because it surely was no wonder at all. Their team still didn’t function together half the times they needed to and no one was sure if that was going to change after the third years were leaving. They never really practiced without them, so no one could actually guess if they would be fine or worse on their own. Whatever it would be, it was certain that it would be a shit ton of work.

Beside Konoha’s lack of enthusiasm he looked around his teammates. The atmosphere was off for quite some time, days even, ever since their vice-captain snapped, cursing and insulting his juniors for ‘never being able to lead even middle-scholars’. At that time anyone seemed to have decided it didn’t bother them, but looking at their faces now, it actually did. Not because they were wimps or easy to offend, but because they know that there was some truth to it.  
No one said a word, not even Komi, who sure was the most fitting to lead anyone, but was forbidden through his position. Konoha sighed heavily, even thinking about standing up and leaving without a word just to escape the awkwardness. He always hated difficult topics and would always hate them in the future.

“What about Bokuto-san?”

“Huh?”  
every head suddenly turned in Akaashi’s direction, who was silent until then and happened to say what he said as if it was the simplest thing to suggest.

“Bokuto?” Konoha nearly blurted out, because that idea sounded too awful in his ears “That airhead? What are you thinking? He can’t even concentrate on himself”  
No one thought about Bokuto, of course no one did. He was chaotic, loud, uncontrollable and hard to handle even with ten people around who incredibly enough happen to like and care about him. Konoha sure loved his obnoxiously expressive friend in some way, but having someone like him as a team captain seemed to be counterproductive.

Against all odds Akaashi was serious and calm, a very slight smile on his lips that Konoha wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t been sitting right next to him.

“I don’t think that. Bokuto-san is very focused when it comes to volleyball. He is also very fond of all of you and I’m sure it’s the same the other way around. He’s energetic and confident of victory and never misses an opportunity to motivate the people around him. I’m certain he would make a good captain”

“Eh?”  
Konoha’s inner protest got stuck in his throat halfway through Akaashi’s explanation and he suddenly felt horrible for even starting it. He didn’t expect Akaashi to be actually serious and his reasons unexpectedly convincing. All the other second years also felt silent, staring at their first year setter with both astonishment and confusion.

“Eeeeeehhhh???” the last loud and confused sound came from none other than Bokuto himself, who actually didn’t pay attention to the whole conversation.

“Why are YOU so surprised? Haven’t you thought about this?” Konoha raises his brow, silently happy that no one seemed pissed at him for being disrespectful before. Thinking about it, Bokuto sure was an idiot and all but he did have a talent to motivate everyone around him when he’s in a good mood.

“Eh.. w-what? NO? Not at all” Bokuto shook his head with the most blunt expression possible, but started to grin his brightest grin shortly after, turning his head to Akaashi with such a fast movement Konoha thought his neck must have snapped “Y-you really think I would be a good captain, Akaashi??”

“Sure” Akaashi answered casually. “I don’t see a reason why not. I do believe you’re capable and it seems that no one else is willing to do it. I actually don’t want to influence everyone’s decision. I’m still new to this team. It’s just a thought.”  
He looked around the group and seemed to notice just now that everybody was still silent and stared at him with unreadable expressions. “I apologize if I said something I shouldn’t have” he added shortly after and slightly bowed his head.

“No, no. Of course you can also help to decide! Who cares if you’re a first year. You’re part of the team and you do have a point.” Komi chuckled awkwardly and scratched the back of his neck “I honestly never thought about that possibility. What do you think, Bo? You up for the task?”

“Ah, O-OF COURSE!!!” Bokuto almost yelled, his cheeks pink from excitement “I will be the best captain you’ll ever have!! HEY HEY HEY”

He was loud, his whole body tense and his eyes sparkled like a kid’s who just won the first price at a competition. All of his teammates suddenly started to smile or openly laugh at the sight of him getting all hyper, even Konoha with his bad mood couldn’t completely hold it in and chuckled. It was kind of weird, but he realized that maybe it wasn’t only Bokuto but the whole air around him, which sometimes changed from frustrated and cold to light and easy-going in just mere seconds. His grin was infectious and the whole tension simply vanished just like that. Everybody visibly relaxed and maybe also realized that what Akaashi said about Bokuto’s attributes was actually true.

“So It’s decided then?” Sarukui showed one of his most genuine smiles, every tension and frustration completely gone “In fact, I think this is a great idea. So what about you become our vice captain then, Akaashi-san?”

“Me?” Akaashi was surprised, which was unusual because his expression rarely changed. He was unreadable most of the time and Konoha was irritated that he actually showed an honest reaction now of all times.  
Apart from that, he wasn’t surprised at all about Bokuto’s behavior. He was sitting opposite Akaashi and his eyes almost sparkled. He sat on his knees and lightly bounced up and down as if he couldn’t wait to jump to his feet and run a marathon.

“Yeah!!! That would be AWESOME!” Bokuto cheered even before Akaashi could say another word “You would be just perfect at everything I’m lacking!! Ohhh, say yes, Akaashii!! Pretty please?!”

“Uhm, I mean… if that’s what everyone wants? I can do that” Akaashi shyly scratched his chin, looking around to see if anyone raised his voice to protest, but smiled once everyone nodded. He didn’t talk a whole lot and wasn’t the most eye-catching player on the court, but when he smiled like that, Konoha was very sure that none of the ten second years could have denied that he was in fact really really pretty.

“Really?? Whho-hooooooo” Bokuto finally jumped up in a standing position so suddenly that Konoha flinched at the sudden movement although he saw it coming. All the energy he spent during the day had come back and he cheered and ran around and Konoha hadn’t failed to notice that it was different than his usual up. Of course he realized that his friend did get motivated very easily when their new setter talked to him or smiled, that was something everyone must have noticed by now.

“Please calm down Bokuto-san” Akaashi said in his usual calm and composed voice, even if everyone else was laughing.

Konoha swallowed, looking at the pretty guy with his very soothing attitude and wondered. He had a feeling that Akaashi knew exactly what he did by suggesting Bokuto to be team captain and somehow convinced everyone around him without any effort. Who knows, maybe he even figured that the others would suggest him to be vice-captain. Although Konoha couldn’t even pinpoint the reason why, but he looked damn satisfied.

Something was weird. Something about Akaashi and his composure and most definitely about Bokuto being anywhere near him. Konoha was so very sure that something was going to change and he hadn’t decided if he wanted to think about it too much, so he just shoved the thought away until later.

After everyone agreed about their new captain and vice-captain team, they talked about some other things changing, like Akaashi also becoming most certainly their new regular setter and about the necessity to recruit new members in their next year. Konoha honestly didn’t listen to half of the topics since the admired hot shower finally took over all of his thoughts. So it happened to be the most pleasing sound in his ears when Komi finally announced that they should finish and hurry home. Of course Bokuto protested as always.

“We’re stopping already? But I wanna go another round, I’m hella pumped” he announced and flexed his muscles like training somehow didn’t even happen today.

“Seriously??” Konoha groaned while he stood up, feeling his own muscles sore and tired “I would KILL for anything even resembling a bed right now, how can you still be so… you?”

“I’m gonna be captain, right?” Bokuto announced with a radiant grin and pointed at his chest with his thumb “OWL be the best captain around!! So I have to work even harder”

“I’m gonna pretend you didn’t just pull an owl-pun”

“But it will be OWLsome!”

“You’re gonna be a pain in the ass, captain” Konoha teasingly groaned and somehow realizing that calling Bokuto ‘captain’ for the first time didn’t feel weird. It actually felt kind of right, like it was a natural thing to do.

“You gonna look up to me, Ko!” Bokuto proudly said, putting his fists into the side of his hips and standing up to his full body height. Everybody chuckled and some even clapped their new captain on the back or shoulder as they walked by to get changed.

“I’m gonna go home now and think about my life choices” Konoha answered still and turned around to follow his teammates, only to find Bokuto laying his arm around his shoulder and grinning from ear to ear.

“You’ll hella love me”

To be fair, Bokuto shined bright like the sun right then and not even Konoha could continue pretending to be annoyed anymore, so he simply nudged his fist against Bokutos bicep and returned his grin.

“Sure, butthead”

*

“Komi, it’s not going to happen, isn’t it?”

Konoha sighs after some time in peaceful silence. Him and Komi were walking along the street together since they lived in the same direction. Komi pulled his scarf all the way up to his nose when an unpleasantly cold wind made him quiver. To be honest, he looked kind of ridiculous, since he also already started wearing his thick oversized winter coat despite he looked even smaller that way. He didn’t seem to mind though and just looked at his taller teammate with a confused gaze.

“Hm? What do you mean? Bo becoming our captain? He is kinda confident about it”

“I don’t mean that. I mean THEM” Konoha made a gesture in the general direction of the school behind them, not that in clarifies anything, but Komi got it anyway “I can’t stand this, like seriously”  
“Bokuto and Akaashi-san? What’s ‘not going to happen’ with them?”

“Anything” Konoha grumbled and breathed a sigh into the air “Them becoming… you know. Don’t make me say it”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about? They are getting along pretty well, aren’t they? It’s surprising, since Akaashi-san isn’t around for long and the complete opposite of the Airhead. But Bokuto definitely didn’t have as much downs as before, so I’m grateful” Komi chuckled and only turned around when he realized Konoha had stopped walking.

“Komi, you’re kidding me, right?”

“What, why?” Komi looked back at him puzzled, he didn’t get it at all.

“You’re trying to say you haven’t noticed??” Konoha almost blurted out and completely forgot to keep walking at the fact that maybe he actually WAS the only one who noticed “You’re supposed to know Bokuto longer than I have, don’t you? He’s so obviously in love, it’s almost disgusting to watch”

“In… love?” Komi repeated confused and spent a minute or two thinking about it. “I don’t know, really. You sure you’re not over-interpreting something? I mean that would mean Bokuto is… gay, right?”

The way be pronounced ‘gay’ was awkward, but not half as awkward as Konoha feels hearing it. There sure was a reason he himself didn’t say it out loud or even pronounced it in his thoughts and it kind of shattered his outer composure about the topic. It was a weird thing to think about to begin with, since there wasn’t any doubt about Bokutos sexuality before. All of them have talked about girls and types and sometimes passed around porn magazines like every other high-school student and he was never less interested than any other. Konoha even remembered one or two times Bokuto even started with the dirty topics, like pointing out a see-through shirt a girl from their class wore one day at school or asking everyone on the team what they thing the cup-size of the girls volleyball teams coach was. So thinking about their teammate other than perfectly straight was sure a new experience. It was weird and a little bit uneasy.

Looking at Komi, Konoha was sure he was thinking the same thing, because the tips of his ears were pink just like his own and they both started walking in awkward silence until Konoha finally swallowed and found his voice again.

“Actually… I’m pretty sure Bo hasn’t even realized they’re both dudes. And if he has, he doesn’t give a damn.”, he started but still felt too uneasy to lift his gaze up from the pavement “ And honestly? At first I thought this is gonna end like that time Bokuto had a crush on that senior girl”

“Haha don’t remind me. He acted so ridiculous around her, he even forgot his own name by trying to introduce himself” Komi laughed and they both were relieved that the memory sort of broke the awkward tension.

“He sure was. And he was stuck in his dejected mode for like a month after she rejected him.” Konoha continued and their smiles both faded, because that actually was a very unpleasant thing about it “And I was sure it would happen again, ‘cause his mood near Akaashi is even more ridiculous. I seriously thought we have to make Akaashi leave the team to save Bo from the horrors. But well…” he paused for a second or two, picturing the way Akaashi behaved around Bokuto. It was hard to read his expression most of the time and too discreet to call it affection, but he clearly wasn’t annoyed or bothered at all, even when Bokuto never ever shuts up about anything volleyball-related, seeking his attention and praise every time he gets a chance or making stupid owl-puns or (Konoha almost shuddered by the thought of it) trying to flirt what he thinks was subtle and was actually far from it.

“AAHH! Who would have thought they actually get along?” Konoha ruffled his blond hair and felt his cheeks getting hot “I’ll seriously get sick if I have to watch them even longer NOT becoming... anything. They’re dancing around each other for weeks, Komi. WEEKS”

“Well, yeah. If you put it like that” Komi awkwardly answered.

Konoha swallowed hard, he knew there was no way he didn’t notice, no way anyone didn’t notice, but there was a high possibility of everyone trying to ignore the fact how weird Bokuto behaved around the first Year. Konoha also tried to ignore and refused to give it a name for some time, but he never was a person of much patience and eventually gave in.

“So you DO agree, right? We need to do something. That love-sick fucker isn’t going to succeed anywhere without our help. Goddamn I will force him to confess at one point” Konoha clenched his fists in determination. He never wanted to be some kind of wing-man, especially not for a weird gay crush, but on the other hand he couldn’t ignore the fact that their new teammate has an unexpected ability to handle Bokutos moods much better than anyone else. So if this was a real opportunity to help improve the whole situation about Bokutos downs and eventually the whole atmosphere around him and the team’s spirit, they should take it. Even if it meant to hook Bokuto up with another dude.

“Calm down, Konoha-san” Komi chuckles a little “I’m sure it will turn out well. I honestly don’t know about Akaashi-san, since he’s maybe just too... I don’t know, too polite to turn him down? Who knows if he even considers something like... uhm ‘that’. However, it’s embarrassing to admit, but if you really think about it they kind of complete each other in every aspect”

“Ugh, do you want me to throw up??? Don’t say disgusting stuff like that, seriously”

Komi laughed at the excessively disgusted grimace his teammate is making, but deep down both knew that it was far away from what he truly thinks about it. In fact, Konoha did know exactly what he meant. Akaashi was indeed very opposite from Bokuto, calm, polite, thoughtful and smart. And very very pretty, but Konoha would never say this out loud.

“Alright, I’ll help so you don’t have to suffer permanent nausea. And how do we do that exactly?”

“Ugh, how do I know? Lock them in the broom closet?” Konoha didn’t know he would get as far as thinking about an actual plan at all, so he was at a loss what to do all of a sudden.

“Hahaha, you think that would help?”

“Propably not. Akaashi is far too smart to be tricked in a closet. And Bo is too damn clumsy to use those kind of opportunity”

“I don’t think that’s the problem” Komi snorted “Maybe we just talk to Akaashi-san? He sure is smart, there’s no way he doesn’t know Bokuto has his eyes on him”

“God, don’t make me talk about embarrassing things with HIM. He… kinda creeps me out sometimes.” Konoha shuddered to think about Akaashis unreadable expression “I mean, maybe he kinda likes him back… but also maybe he wants to murder us all in our sleep. I can’t figure out what he’s thinking at all”

Komi snorted into his scarf with silent laughter. “I didn’t know calm and polite people scare you”

“Hey!” Konohas cheeks went beet red “I’m not scared! Stop laughing”  
Komi didn’t, his laugh got louder instead and Konoha shoved his friend with gentle force. He sure sounded wimpy, but he was kind of serious about not being able to read their new setter’s expression. It simply was uneasy.

“Haha sorry sorry” Komi eventually gave in after a moment and went back to the topic “Anyway, Bokuto likes him, alright? You should at least trust his judge of character. He’s quite good at that”

“Except for that third year girl” Konoha added  
“Well, except for her, yes”

Right then, they reached the point where they always split up their ways to head home, so both stopped and looked at each other. Komi was about to repeat his idea of simply talking with the guys directly and Konoha about to protest again, when his cell phone made an awful sound of high-pitched laughter to announce an incoming message. Just as he looked at the screen, he began laughing.

“I think there is another idiot thinking about the same thing” Konoha announced and even before Komi could ask, he held his phone right in his face to read for himself.

 **from: stray bed-head cat**  
_Jo, Kono. You in for hooking up Bo with prettyboy?_  
 _He just sent me 26 messages bout them becoming captain and vice-captain and how ‘absOWLutely awesome’ that is._  
 _They so need to get laid help me_

 **To: stray bed-head cat**  
_Komi and me are in_ (｡◝‿◜｡)


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well well how fast was that?  
> I actually think about this fic a lot and had lots of free time lately, so here we go with the new chapter. Thanks so much for every kudo and comment, I appreciate it a lot.  
> I'm already halfway trough chapter 5, so maybe you don't have to wait long. Enjoy ;)

“Kuroo-san?” Akaashi roughly remembered the guy Bokuto introduced to him in the first week. Incredibly tall, long athletic limbs, black bed-hair and a cat-like grin you won’t forget easily. “I do recall him. From Nekoma High School, wasn’t he?”  


“Yes!!” Bokuto answered as soon as the last syllable left Akaashi’s throat “Wow, you’re really good at remembering stuff like this. I don’t even remember what I ate the day before yesterday”

 

“It was pork buns” Akaashi answered without any effort at all and Bokuto’s mouth fell open.

 

“You’re so smart, Akaashi!!” he cheered, just a little too loud to be considered a volume fitting for indoors.

 

“I just know because you told me how good they were three times that day” Akaashi answered casually, only to get a loud laugh ringing in his ears anyway. Since they decided who was going to be team captain, Bokuto was overall happy and euphoric, which was good for both him and the team spirit.

 

“Yeah, I remember now!! The homemade ones from my Mom are the BEST” Bokuto gestured wildly with both his hands like that could somehow explain his love for meaty dishes “You should totally try them! I’ll bring you some next time!”

 

“Sure” Akaashi shrugged “So, what about him? Kuroo-san, I mean?”

 

“Ah, right!” Bokuto seemed to have already forgotten what the conversation was about in the first place and started falling over his own words all of a sudden “He uhm.. h-he asked if you wanna come hang with us tomorrow! Just you know… eh… like friends. Because we’re friends, right? And Kuroo is my best buddy, so you’re also friends, right?”

 

“That’s not how it works, Bokuto-san”

 

“But it should!!! You’ll like him, I’m sure! Please?”

  
“I already finished my homework, so I’m free” Akaashi sighed, he wasn’t able to reject any of Bokuto’s requests in the end. But it was fine, he didn’t mind spending the afternoon with his senior and his friend. At least he didn’t anticipate what was about to happen.

  
“Really? AWESOME!”

 

*

 

“So do you have any siblings?” It wasn’t the first question and it wouldn’t be the last. They were sitting in a small café both Bokuto and his black haired friend seemed to be familiar with, since they walked all the way to the building without paying too much attention to their surroundings. They also greeted the waiter at the entrance with a simple ‘hey’ instead of the polite ‘good afternoon’ Akaashi offered, but maybe they were just rude to everyone, he really couldn’t tell.

 

“No. I’m a single child” Akaashi answered and sipped on his green tea. They sat at a table at the corner of the room, which was far too huge for only three people, but since there weren’t many customers, it should be okay. Bokuto and Kuroo sat next to each other on the opposite of Akaashi and he started to feel like this was some kind of weird good cop - bad cop interrogation you often see in bad crime-series. Except for the fact that he wasn’t quite sure who of them was supposed to be the good and who the bad one and what it was that he actually did to deserve this.

 

“I thought so, you don’t seem to be someone who had to get along with siblings. And you’re incredibly well educated. I bet you’ve got the best grades in your class, am I right?”

  
“Why are you asking me all these questions, Kuroo-san?” Akaashi finally brought himself to ask without feeling too rude. He answered every question about his age and height and favorite food without complaint, but he started to get annoyed.

 

“Why, do you feel embarrassed?”

 

“No. It’s just weird”

 

“It’s not weird at all. I’m Bo’s best buddy, so I need to know about his friends, right?”

 

“He said something similar. You’re both weird”

  
“But a lovable weird, right?” Kuroo showed a mischievous grin and Akaashi wasn’t quite sure what to expect from that. Bokuto laughed awkwardly, his gaze bouncing between the two other guys like their conversation was some kind of tennis-match and he couldn’t wait to know who would be the winner. Besides that, he was unusually quiet.  


Akaashi sighed. Kuroo was indeed a troublesome person. His gaze seemed to see right trough him and his grin never vanished nor changed the slightest bit, even if Akaashi refused to answer a question or answered it in a way it shouldn’t be satisfying. On the other hand, Akaashi didn’t exactly know the reasons for all the questions about his person or what answers he was SUPPOSED to give to be satisfying.

  
“So?” Kuroo smiled and Akaashi also couldn’t help to realize the round curious amber eyes right next to him.  
  
“I’m not the best in class, but I guess I’m quite good with my studies” he finally answered and took a sip from his tea “I assume you are a grade above me like Bokuto-san, so why would you be interested in my studies?”

 

“Oh, I’m not” Kuroo waved his hand in denial, but didn’t stop grinning “You played volleyball in middle school too, right? Bo told me you’re an incredible setter”

 

Akaashi turned his head to actually look at the person right next to Kuroo, just to find Bokuto nodding vigorously with a slight shade of pink on his cheeks.  
  
“I did” Akaashi answered as a matter of fact without turning his gaze back to Kuroo.  
  
“Nice. I’ll be sure to ask for a practice match between Nekoma and you guys after the third years left. I was actually chosen to be captain unanimously”

  
“What? Really?????” Finally, Bokuto’s voice filled the room again “Why didn’t you tell me?? We’re both gonna be captain, that’s so cool!”. He practically bounced up and down in his chair until Kuroo almost abandoned his mischievous gaze and faithfully laughed as he turned to his friend.  
  
“It was supposed to be a surprise, dumphead” he grinned “So we can celebrate together with your setter here, right?”

 

Akaashi wasn’t sure how the two guys in front of him are related to each other, but what he definitely was certain about was that this kind of interrogation was far from ‘celebrating’. And aside from that, why should they want him of all people to be around.

 

“I invited some of the others too, but they seem to be late. Why don’t you go check if anyone is outside waiting for us?”

  
“YES!!” Bokuto jumped to his feet, his exuberantly happy smile started to spread all around him “I’m right back, don’t start celebrating without me!!”

 

Akaashi took a breath to say something, but Bokuto was out of sight even before he sorted his thoughts to actually form a question.  


“Sooo” Kuroo started, resting his chin on one hand and his unreadable grin was back “Listen, pretty boy”

 

‘Pretty… boy?’ Akaashi was confused about that weird nickname, but didn’t say anything.  
  
“I’m sure you’re smart, so I don’t have to tell you about my stupid oblivious airhead of a friend here” He nodded in the general direction of the entrance, where Bokuto currently pushed open the door to find whoever could have arrived, if anyone WAS even coming, Akaashi was not sure about that, because Kuroo obviously just wanted to catch Akaashi alone.  
“The thing is, my dear pretty boy, he’s anxious and hella awkward and I’m sure he’s also as blunt as man can be when he tries to flirt. With you, as a matter of fact”

 

Akaashi still didn’t say a thing. First because Kuroo hadn’t finished talking, second because his mind suddenly became very empty.

 

“He’s whining to me a lot, you know. I’m his friend and I love him and I’ll of course support every stupid idea he has, but my hands are tied here. You seem like a good guy, which is surprising, because the last crush he had turned out to be an incredibly egocentric asshole. Can’t blame him for it though, she was also incredibly pretty. Well” Kuroo shrugged and waved it of like it wasn’t anything that mattered right now. “You on the other hand, you’re not incurious about him, right?”

 

Finally, Kuroo stopped and looked at him in a way that awaited an answer. Akaashi swallowed thickly and watched the entrance instead of him. The sudden change of topic was uncomfortable enough as it was, so he kind of hoped for Bokuto to come back right away to interrupt. It didn’t happen.  
  
“I don’t know what you are implying Kuroo-san” Akaashi finally answered as calm and casual as he was capable of.  
  
“Ah but I’m sure you do. Bo is not my only friend in your team, you know” Kuroos grin turned even wider and Akaashi actually found himself getting cornered “You sure like seeing him happy, don’t you? His good moods are addicting, I’m well aware of that. But I was told that he’s clinging to you like a puppy and you still never chase him off. Long story short, I need you to do me a favor”

 

Akaashi looked to the entrance again. It was simply impossible it took THAT long for Bokuto to look outside and come back right away. At least when he was not hindered on purpose, which was a very high possibility with what Kuroo just indicated.

 

Kuroo didn’t bother to wait for Akaashi to say something again, he simply continued with his strange request. It would have felt intimidating, if his impression didn’t change all of a sudden. Before, his voice was almost teasing, but now he seemed _serious_.

 

“Just… help him out, yeah? It won’t hurt to give him a little push and see what happens”

 

Akaashi pressed his lips together, but didn’t loose his outer composure nevertheless. His resting calm face was most definitely the reason why Kuroo’s request came out more like a question than anything else and an awkward silence followed soon after his words were spoken, hanging heavily over both of them.  
  
Luckily or maybe unfortunately Bokuto finally came back. In fact, is wasn’t just him but a whole bunch of people and Akaashi realized that Kuroo wasn’t lying at all when he said he invited more friends.

 

“Kuroo!! Look who came! That’s so awesome, I haven’t seen some of them in so long!” Bokuto exitedly announced as he bounced back to their table “They even brought Kenma, how amazing is that?”

  
“Hey, you actually managed to separate him from the PS4, Tora?” Kuroo was of course the first to turn around and greet some guys Akaashi had never seen before.

 

“Wasn’t as easy as you think, you owe me one, future captain” a loud guy with a bleached Mohawk answered. He stood next to a shorter seemingly misplaced guy with longer bleached hair with his black roots grown out, who avoided everyone gaze like he wanted to leave again right away. The third guy was also visibly shorter than Bokuto and Mohawk-guy, had light brown hair and a friendly smile on his lips.

Akaashi slightly nodded to greet the strangers. Besides them, Konoha and Komi also entered his field of vision and he could catch a hint of Konoha shoving his cell phone back in his back pocket right as Kuroo’s phone seemed to signal a new message. It didn’t take long to figure out what was going on, but Akaashi stayed silent.

 

He felt uncomfortable with this newly found knowledge. Sure, he was aware of Bokuto’s behavior and he wasn’t oblivious enough to not know what he was intending in one way or another. He also found himself not being bothered by it, even if he maybe should be. Having someone like Bokuto around him most of the time didn’t feel too bad and he indeed never actually thought about ‘chasing him off’. On the other hand, he also never thought about ‘giving him a push’ or acting for the purpose of bringing things further. Anyway, he wasn’t aware of the fact that they both were under supervision or that Bokuto maybe or as a matter of fact most definitely talked about him with his friends. Akaashi never really had friends close enough to make conversation about personal stuff, neither was the type to do so with his parents. He never felt sad about the lack of it, but tended to forget that other people were different than him.

 

So, people _observed_ him. Not only as a setter or as a person, but observed him and his senior, who was apparently trying to get them somewhere.

  
‘Why did I never realize?’ he asked himself instead of taking part in the conversation that just started around him.

 

*

  
It was quite late in the evening and of course Bokuto convinced Akaashi to stay after practice to train tossing and spiking. Akaashi never once denied his begging for more training, but on that day he even planned on staying longer anyway. It fed on both strength and nerves, but in the end Bokuto always grinned in an all-over satisfied way his setter wasn’t able to deny seeing.

 

They just finished cleaning, always in company of Bokuto boasting about everything they accomplished today over and over again. It was almost cute, really. Just like an eleven year old boy who found a beetle and couldn’t help it to show it to every family member for a millionth time.

 

The clubroom was silent and it was long past dusk when they finally called it a day. Akaashi felt tired from a very long day plus extra hours of training and was looking forward to take a shower once he went home. He stood with the back to Bokuto while changing and he was well aware of the fact that his senior always felt save then. Save enough to _stare_ at him, at least. Akaashi noticed quite a few times, but never said a thing, but after that conversation with Kuroo he actually wanted to try ‘pushing’.

 

“You’re staring, Bokuto-san” he said casually and caught his senior off guard, when he pulled his shirt over his head and felt the familiar sensation of two amber ayes at the back of his neck.

 

“Eh??”

 

“You’re staring at me”

 

“What? No I don’t?”

 

Akaashi knew his senior was blushing behind his back without turning around to check.  


“I-I’m not staring!!” Bokutos answer was far too fast and spluttered to actually sound convincing “Why should I? It’s not that I haven’t seen you change like a MILLION times by now”

 

“That’s true. But you were staring all these times too. It’s quite obvious, actually”

 

“ugh..” this time there was no answer aside from a choked sound and Akaashi couldn’t resist to let a small chuckle escape, of course without being noticed. Finally he turned his head and found that he was right, Bokuto’s ears and neck were bright pink. He was sitting on a bench on the other side of the room and froze in the middle of removing his thigh high knee protection. Akaashi swallowed, because he rarely paid attention to how handsome Bokuto could be when he didn’t blind everyone of this aspect with his dorkyness. Looking at him with an actual intention in mind was different.

  
“Do you want to touch?” Akaashi let the words escape his mouth without thinking about it too much. He just needed to give it _a little push_ , right?

 

“What?”

 

“Touch. My body. You sure look like you want to, Bokuto-san”

 

Akaashi led his shirt slide to the bench regardless without waiting for an answer and walked over to the confused guy until he was in front of him, nearly close enough to stand right between his knees.

  
“Go ahead, I don’t mind”

 

Bokuto’s mouth moved like he was going to say something, but apparently failed his attempt. He swallowed and bit his lip, probably without noticing, but Akaashi saw it anyway, like he did see all of the little things Bokuto did without realizing that they weren’t as ulterior as he thought they would be. Akaashi wasn’t certain about this at all, but reading Bokuto’s expression from up this close, he sure looked like he WANTED to touch him really badly. However he didn’t move a muscle and Akaashi started to suspect that ‘a little push’ wasn’t enough to change anything.

 

He always had a lot of patience, especially when it comes to dealing with Bokuto and it was surprisingly cute how his senior was so expressive about everything all the time, but wasn’t able to simply do something like touching him without hesitating, even after given permission to. Akaashi only realized just then that his body somehow leaned even closer to his senior, almost feeling the warmth of the other body. There was a different air about them and no one was quite sure when or where it came from. It wasn’t even the first time they were this close, but this time it was _different_.

 

Anyway, nothing happened.

 

After what seemed to be minutes, Akaashi slowly reached out and grabbed both of Bokuto’s wrists to place his hands on his bare chest, realizing that the touch felt quite nice, warm skin on skin even though his hands felt a little sweaty. That wasn’t too bad.

 

As expected the other guy was still frozen in place, staring up at his junior’s face with wide eyes, only his fingers twitched a small bit at the sensation. Akaashi kept hold of his hands, he had a guess that Bokuto would remove them right away if he was given the chance. To be honest, Akaashi hadn’t thought about what was supposed to happen next, he had hoped that the situation would somehow continue on its own. Now he was at a loss, only feeling a very slight movement of muscle in Bokuto’s wrists, unsure if he was allowed to move his fingers at all.

 

Akaashi’s mind worked painfully slow. Maybe he was supposed to say something, either stop everything or push it further, it seemed to be his choice to decide. But he wasn’t thinking clearly and somehow felt that a single spoken word would scatter the intimate atmosphere and make it turn into something incredibly awkward.

Staring into intense amber eyes responding to his own gaze with both perplexity and expectation wasn’t helping at all. The only thing he was certain at that moment was _no_ , this couldn’t _end_ right there. He didn’t want it to end.

 

Without breaking eye contact, Akaashi started to slowly guide Bokuto’s hands down his torso. The sensation actually felt very nice, sending little bolts of electricity down his spine and Bokuto’s rough fingers left a trail of burning heat wherever they met his skin.

  
Bokuto was still staring right in his eyes, but soon his gaze was transfixed to his own hands sliding down Akaashi’s abdomen and then followed every centimeter his fingertips touched, mesmerized and undoubtedly gone with his mind. He swallowed thickly, his breath heavier than before and weirdly audible in the silence of the clubroom. He seemed dazzled, overwhelmed almost and one could easily tell that he did like that a lot.

 

Akaashi let his fingers brush his stomach and hipbones, feeling another shudder down his spine and stopped only at he edge of his shorts. The air around them suddenly felt a lot hotter than before and even Akaashi felt his face flush.

 

He heard Bokuto’s heavy breaths, felt his hot, sweaty palms on his hips and certainly knew Bokuto was just as aroused by it as he was. He must have felt the same things, the same tension, the fact that none of them said a word or moved even an inch for the last few moments and the almost burning air around them. He experienced all that and started asking himself what would happen if he doesn’t stop here, like he originally intended to.

 

His mind started to rush like a rollercoaster, imagining how it would feel being touched by those hands in different places. He imagined it being a little different, rough, demanding, without initiating it by himself. He was irritated by this line of thoughts, but wasn’t able to stop them anyhow.

 

Akaashi was taken aback as he felt a slight movement. His breath suddenly felt a lot heavier than before as he looked down to his senior again, noticing that he indeed had moved his legs to sit more comfortable. Bokuto’s hands finally slid to the sides of Akaashi’s hips on their own, still hesitating and barely moving at all, but for some reason it was enough for Akaashi to send a familiar heat down his stomach. He couldn’t stop his eyes moving from Bokuto’s hands on his hips, beyond his arms and upper body and his muscular thighs.

Bokuto was suddenly shifting uncomfortably on the bench and bit his bottom lip hard in embarrassment.  
“Bokuto-san” Akaashi broke the silence and felt his cheeks heat up even more “You’re ha-“

 

His sentence was interrupted by heavy footsteps, suddenly appearing outside the door and becoming louder at a quick pace. Even though the late hour, someone was coming back to the clubroom.

Without another word, Akaashi let go of his senior’s hands, turned around and stepped away, back to his bag and the abandoned shirt and continued to change like nothing ever happened, when the door swung open and Konoha stepped in.

  
“God bless you’re still here. I forgot my damned bag and I need it and—“ he choked the rest of his sentence just to stare at Bokuto with wide eyes “Bokuto, why the hell do you have a boner??”

 

“What? I don’t have… uh... wait… I actually...” Bokuto stammered awkwardly, but was unable to hide his arousal. Akaashi felt a little guilty, it was his fault after all, although he wasn’t aware of Bokuto becoming hard by something so minor. Of course there wasn’t any doubt that he also felt some heat growing in his body and he would have been lying to say he wasn’t aroused, but simply not to that extent.

 

“Actually, stop! I DON’T wanna know!” Konoha said quickly with a beet read head “At least turn around, god damn it. I don’t want to see this”

 

“Ugh.. uhm… s-SORRY” Bokuto grabbed the seam of his shirt and tried to pull it down to hide the bulge in his crotch, his head at least as red as Konoha’s.

  
“I’m leaving first” Akaashi interrupted when he finished changing into his casual clothes and packed his back in a hurry. He shouldered his bag and smiled the most innocent smile like nothing ever happened at all. “Don’t forget to lock the door and stay safe on your way home, Bokuto-san. You too Konoha-san. Good Night”

 

And just like that, he left.

 

*

 

 **from: konoha 11:45 pm**  
to: komi  
You won’t believe what just happened  


**to: konoha 11:50 pm**  
from: komi  
What? Where are you  


**from: konoha 11:45 pm**  
to: komi  
At the gym, forgot my bag. I just walked in on the most irritating scene I’ve witnessed all week. We absolutely need a rule about that

 

 **to: konoha 11:50 pm**  
from: komi  
I don’t understand?

 

 **from: konoha 11:45 pm**  
to: komi  
I walked in on BOKUTO having a huge fucking BONER in the changing room. Akaashi was there too, but didn’t seem to mind at all

**to: konoha 11:50 pm**  
from: komi  
What the hell? What happened?

 

 **from: konoha 11:53 pm**  
to: komi  
Yeah, shit is getting serious. Whatever it is that Kuroo said to him, it’s fucking working

 

 **to: konoha 11:55 pm**  
from: komi  
Isn’t that a good thing?  


**from: konoha 11:58 pm**  
to: komi  
Its NOT good that I WALKED IN THERE. I said I’ll help hook them up, not WATCHING them hook up for gods sake. That was a SERIOUS hard-on and I don’t think I want to see that again.

 

 **to: konoha 00:02 am**  
from: komi  
Ok ok, I get it. We’ll think of something

 

 **from: konoha 00:05 am**  
to: komi  
I don’t think you do, that thing was MASSIVE

 

 **to: konoha 00:10 am**  
from: komi  
Please stop

 

**from: konoha 00:12 am  
to: komi, stupid smiley saru, creepyface-washio…**

NEW RULE: When the lights in the clubroom are still on after everyone left, DON’T EVER GO IN!!!

 

 **to: konoha 00:14 am**  
from: komi  
I can live with that

 

 **to: komi 00:20 am**  
from: konoha  
damn… I forgot my bag


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lot of little somethings in this chapter are dedicated to my sister, because she absolutely adores Kenma to bits. I tried really really damn hard to get his character on point and I'm quite proud that she seems to love it :)
> 
> This may be a little KuroKen-ish, but don't worry it's not a "side-chapter" at all, the story still progresses (slowly). The next chapter will take a while though, sorry about that. I'm busy with cosplay/convention and other stuff, but I'll hope to get back to writing soon!
> 
> Also, I do enjoy writing Kuroo so much, he's maybe probably my most favourite character to write at the moment!

“Why do you care so much?”

Kenma was sitting on Kuroo’s bed, which was the spot he was most familiar with when he spent time at his place. His knees where pressed to his chest comfortably and his gaze was transfixed on the screen of the PSP in his hands. Besides the small _bashs_ and _peeps_ from his console, the steady footsteps of Kuroo filled the room and it started to irritate his concentration in playing his game. Which was the reason he raised his voice in the first place.  
  
“Because he is my friend.” was the simple answer from the taller guy and he seemed to think that this was explanation enough to run around like he had ants in his pants.

 

“I know that. But you’re walking up and down since almost two hours.” Kenma continued without turning from the little hero swinging his sword on the console. “It’s irritating”

 

“He hasn’t texted me since we left the cafe, Kenma” Kuroo groaned and tapped on the screen of his cell phone just to find that there was no new message still. It couldn’t be possible for him to miss one, since the phone was almost glued to his hands ever since Bokuto and his teammates waved them goodbye to go to training late this afternoon. He checked every five minutes anyway for whatever reason but Kenma couldn’t bring himself to ignore his nervous behavior completely.

 

“That wasn’t even that long ago. Just leave him alone”

 

Kuroo finally stopped walking, just to stare Kenma down with his concerned-parent-face, which was so familiar to Kenma that he even recognized it from the corner of his eyes without turning his head.

  
“He’s BOKUTO” Kuroo explained and pinched the root of his nose in distress “He texts me when he thinks his snot has a weird color, for gods sake”

 

“That’s disgusting…”

 

“Yeah it is, but you understand what I’m trying to say? Him NOT texting either means he’s dead or somehow not able to and I currently have no fucking clue if that’s good or bad” Kuroo groaned again and let himself fall onto the mattress next to Kenma, who quietly complained about the movement of his furniture of choice to – until then uninterrupted – play his game.

“I mean, honestly. Do you think I was too, you know… weird? Did I scare Akaashi off? Have I destroyed Bo’s chances?”

 

Kenma didn’t answer. The boss-enemy he was fighting right then was tougher than he expected. It was the third time in a row his hero was so close to death that he had to use a potion. He also only had two potions and one ether left now and the enemy still had nearly full health and he didn’t even play on the hardest difficulty. He silently blamed Kuroo who just needed to involve him in annoying matters. He hardly ever wanted to be involved with troublesome ideas of his childhood friend and the wayward owl boy, because whenever they stick their heads together nothing good comes out of it.  
  
“Kenma?!”

 

“Hm?”

 

“I’m asking you questions, please don’t ignore me”

 

“Hm… I don’t know”

 

“Come on, just let me hear your opinion” Kuroo whined, rolling around to his side and poking his index finger into Kenma’s shoulder. “Were you listening?”

 

“Mmh” Kenma answered with a small hum, listening with one ear while he thought if it was a good idea to sacrifice half of his hero’s health to start his special attack, which was strong but probably not strong enough to beat his opponent.

 

“Do you think Akaashi is mad that I barged into his... _something_ with Bo?”  
  
At the corner of his eye Kenma saw Kuroo turning onto his back and staring at the ceiling. It was rare for him to be seriously concerned, especially when it was about his own behavior. He normally wasn’t even close to any lack of self-confidence nor did he regret his actions very often. While the short cut-scene signaling the beginning of his special attack appeared on his screen, he glanced at his friend. He had a serious expression and Kenma wondered when he last saw it outside of the court.

 

“I like Akaashi. He’s quiet” Kenma said after they fell silent for a few minutes.

 

“That’s not what I asked at all” Kuroo sighed, sat up and slid to the back of the mattress to lean his back against the wall right next to his shorter friend. Their eyes met for a second until Kenma turned back to his game, concentrating on his hero who as expected wasn’t able to finish the enemy with one blow and now struggled once again. “Can you please talk to me seriously?”

 

Kenma wrinkled his nose just as his hero got hit by a ridiculously strong magic attack and fell on his knees in an overdramatic motion for the fifth time that evening. The screen of his PSP flashed up with the words ‘game over’ and he pressed the pause-button. Finally, he lifted his head again and turned his gaze to Kuroo, signaling that he was actually listening.

 

“I screwed up, haven’t I?” Kuroo asked, earnestly concerned.

 

“They’ll be fine” Kenma simply answered and shrugged his shoulders “Probably”

 

“Well, they got along pretty damn well until now, so that won’t change so fast, I guess. Damn I couldn’t read that pretty boy at all. His expression didn’t even change one bit, I’m not used to that” Kuroo ran a hand through his bed-head, which didn’t quite make it worse, but not better either. “He was so quiet and polite, I couldn’t tell if he enjoyed the company or wanted us all to leave him alone”

 

Kenma tried to remember what happened at the café at the early afternoon. What he remembered the most was that he was bothered by the excessive amount of loud voices belonging to Yamamoto and Bokuto and also sometimes Yaku and Fukurodani’s libero when Bokuto joked about their height. Akaashi on the other hand was very calm and reserved, only speaking up to remind Bokuto to lower his voice inside the café. Most of the time he simply listened to the conversation, slightly nodding or shaking his head but mostly sipping his tea and minding his own business. Kenma rarely felt comfortable with strangers, but couldn’t deny that Akaashi’s company was indeed more pleasant than most of his actual friend’s.

 

“He seemed lost in thoughts to me”

 

“Really? How can you tell?” Kuroo raised a brow in wonder.

 

“mh” Kenma shrugged again. There wasn’t anything in particular that he noticed about Akaashi’s behavior proving his guess. He simply knew, like some kind of intuition.

 

“When I think about it, you two are quite similar. Maybe you have better chances to understand what he’s thinking” Kuroo stated with en expectant voice. It wasn’t hard to figure out that it was asked too much of him to understand a person so different from himself. Most of his friends and teammates were quite similar, happy and loud and quite simple to get along with. Except for Kenma.

 

“You understand ME quite well” Kenma hugged his legs, turned his head to the side and placed a cheek on his knees, watching Kuroo through the curtain of blond hair falling over his face.

 

“Because I know you since kindergarten, that’s something completely different” Kuroo buried his face in his palms and groaned “God damn, this is fucking frustrating. I want Bo to succeed so badly, but I’m no use at all”

 

Kenma still looked at his face in silence and he wanted to ask why it was so important to him to help Bokuto with his crush. He surely would answer ‘because he’s my friend’ again, but that wasn’t exactly what Kenma meant. Kuroo helped his friends with a lot of things at a lot of times, but for some reason he seemed far more personally involved in it than before. Probably because it wasn’t about volleyball, studying or the decision what food to order or what clothes to wear or any other daily topic. Maybe, probably it was because this time, it was about actual emotions and in the end, Kuroo wasn’t that experienced with the topic himself to give proper advice. Maybe that’s why he seemed so miserable, at least Kenma thought so.

 

Instead of saying something, he lifted one hand to pat Kuroo’s head. It was a rare gesture and he was completely aware of that, but it was the only thing he knew to calm his friend when he was upset.

 

“You’re sweaty” he stated when his fingers slightly brushed the black strands. It wasn’t particularly pleasant, but he didn’t flinch regardless. There never was anything like discomfort between them, or if there was, he couldn’t remember.

 

“Mmh, sorry. Didn’t shower after training” Kuroo’s voice was almost a hum and he visibly leaned into Kenma’s touch like a cat thirsting for attention. “I don’t want to miss a call or a message, you know? Bo can be a real baby when I’m not there to comfort him 24/7”

 

“Go take a shower” Kenma said in an almost demanding voice “If he calls, I can catch it and tell him you’ll call back”

 

“You sure about that? You hate phone calls”  
  
“I do” Kenma lowered his hand and earned a slightly disappointed gaze because of the loss of head-patting. “Just for now, it’s okay”

 

“Thanks” a smile spread on Kuroo’s lips. Not a grin or a teasing smirk like most of the time, but a real genuine smile, which he only revealed when he was with Kenma.

“Actually, I feel hella gross and I really _really_ need that shower. I’ll be right back, I promise”

 

He stood up and stretched his back, before handing his cell phone over to Kenma, who took it with a mix of resignation and hope that it actually won’t ring at all. After that he vanished into the hall and Kenma heard the bathroom door soon after he left. Normally Kuroo wasn’t particularly slow at taking showers, so there was a high chance nothing would happen. Except it did, of course

*

 

 **Brokuto calling…  
call accepted**  
  
“DUDE, I JUST JERKED OFF IN THE GYM SHOWER”  
  
**call ended**

**Brokuto calling…**  
 **call declined**  
  
**Brokuto calling…**  
 **call declined**

**Brokuto calling…**  
 **call declined**  
  
**Brokuto calling…**  
 **call accepted**

Kuroo was dripping wet when he came running from the bathroom, towel draped around his hips when he grabbed his cell phone to finally pick up and make the ringing stop. He looked at Kenma in slight confusion, because he abandoned the idea of picking up in his stead. Kenma wasn’t sorry.

“Dude?!” he almost screamed in the phone because even if he was inside the bathroom in the next room, Kenma knew that he must have heard it ringing four times in a row.

 

“Why are you hanging up on me??” Bokuto’s voice on the other side of the line was so loud that Kenma understood every word of it, even if he didn’t want to.

 

“Sorry, I was taking a shower and told Kenma to pick it up… I guess he got scared and hung up”

 

“It’s not _scared_ … it’s _disgusted_ ” Kenma stated in a slightly annoyed voice and had already continued to play his game “I’ll never pick up your phone ever again”. He wasn’t angry or anything, just disappointed in his own judgment. After all the things he happened to know about the bipolar guy with the ridiculous hairstyle and all the times he actually met or talked to him, he should have known that picking up a call couldn’t be expected to be ‘normal’.

“I’m so sorry” Kuroo whispered in Kenma’s direction, but Bokuto didn’t seem to be bothered that he just screamed something like that into an ear that wasn’t his best friend’s at all.

 

“I just jerked off!!!” Bokuto’s voice filled the whole room through this tiny phone once again and Kuroo’s face turned into a grimace.

 

“You screamed in Kenma’s ear that you jerked off? Are you sick in the head?”

“How could I know it’s him??”

“So you actually wanted to scream into MY ear that you masturbated?”

“You don’t understand”

“You’re damn right about that”

 

Kenma glanced at Kuroo and the small puddle of water on the wooden floor that grew with every drop from the wet black mess that was Kuroo’s hair. He felt a slight urge to tease him about how much he wanted Bokuto to call just twenty minutes ago, because right now his expression was a mix of annoyance and shock and still a little concern somewhere, but he was able to hide that well enough.

 

“I’m still at the gym” Bokuto’s voice became more quiet, which means he was still loud enough for Kenma to hear without much effort, but just not as loud as he used to be.

 

“It’s past 11:30 pm? And didn’t you just say you jerked off? At the gym?”

Everyone involved in this conversation was able to pinpoint the exact moment when Kuroo lost his believe in the owl boy’s sanity, which was about right now. “Why are you calling just to tell me that?”

 

“I don’t. I... ugh… I got really really fucking hard and I wasn’t able to go home like that, you know? I don’t think I was that hard in my life, ever!”

 

Kuroo sighed, deeply desperate to the fact that he was kind of obligated to ask for reasons, Kenma figured. He never really understood why he had to be so close to a troublemaker like Bokuto of all people, but on the other hand, he wasn’t a person to judge. Kuroo often pointed out that he would do everything in his power to support his friends, which includes Kenma more often than anyone. It shouldn’t be surprising that the same thing applied to Bokuto as well, it just seemed to be more troublesome in his regards.

 

“So, you wanna tell me what happened? Not that I WANT to know what makes my best friend’s libido go wild, but you’ll tell me anyway, so go ahead and get it over with” Kuroo trapped the phone in the crook of his neck between his ear and his right shoulder to free both his hands and search the wardrobe for clean clothes.

 

“It’s because of Akaashi!!” Bokuto started and for some reason thought it was acceptable to leave it at that for a few seconds as if that wasn’t obvious at all.

 

“No way” Kuroo answered jokingly, but was quickly reminded that sarcasm was a difficult topic to use on his friend. He managed to grab a pair of black boxers and desperately tried to change into them without dropping the towel or the phone. He managed more or less, but Kenma saw a glimpse of his bare butt anyway. Not that he cared.

 

“It’s true!! You won’t believe me though, but I swear It happened!”. The room fell silent again and Kenma was almost sure Bokuto chickened out and hung up until he heard a gasp of air and hesitation, which was a thing that almost never ever happened to Bokuto before. Kuroo also remained silent for a moment, maybe because he wasn’t used to that kind of hesitation. He started to dry his hair with the towel and muffled the sounds of his and Bokuto’s words, but Kenma still managed to eavesdrop.

 

“Bo, I’m seriously hanging up”

“NO WAIT!! Aaahhgghh”

“Spit it out then. I’m not your masturbation coach”

 

“Ew…” Kenma couldn’t stop the sound from escaping his mouth and Kuroo turned his head to glare at him, because if Bokuto heard that it would most likely make it even harder to pull the information. Kuroo took the phone back in his hand and turned it in the opposite direction from his mouth, so that Bokuto couldn’t hear him talk.

 

“Kenma, please” he almost begged. Kenma still pretended to be very busy playing his game, but in fact only swinging the in-game fishing rod for a stupid little side-quest halfheartedly, but Kuroo didn’t need to know that.

“You’re both disgusting.” He stated in a low voice without turning his gaze away from the old shoe his hero managed to fish.

“It wasn’t ME who started that”

“Doesn’t matter, you haven’t ended it either”

 

Another shoe, great.

 

Kuroo audibly exhaled and turned back to the problem at hand. Bokuto still didn’t answer properly, even after the long break in their conversation. “So?” Kuroo spoke into the phone and got another groan from the other side of it, before there was an actual answer.

 

“Akaashi… Akaashi made me touch him”

 

“Wait, what???”

Silence once again, but this time not because of hesitation, but because of a very seriously confused Kuroo, who literally lost all his coolness and even forgot that he was still wearing nothing but his boxers.

 

“Ugh…”

 

“No. No. Don’t ‘ugh’ me, dude. The always so fucking calm and composed pretty boy did exactly what?”

Kuroo didn’t expect that and to be honest, Kenma didn’t either. Sure, it was kind of their goal to make a match between the two guys (Kuroo’s goal, not that Kenma cared at all), but none of them expected it to succeed, not so suddenly at least. Either way, Kenma pressed the pause-button and lifted his head. He would never admit that he was interested in Bokuto’s story, but he was, kind of.

 

“I don’t know exactly, my mind went BLANK, man! He just… sorta grabbed my hands and made me rub his bare chest. I couldn’t move an inch. I was fucking frozen in place! H-He made me touch his chest and his stomach and god damn his fucking hipbones! Kuroo! His skin was so fucking SOFT, I thought I’ll become INSANE! I didn’t know what to do, I kinda panicked or some shit!”

 

“You’re sure you didn’t just fell asleep and had a perverted dream?”

 

“I’m really damn serious! I’m still standing in the locker room at the gym, you know? There’s no way I imagined something like his flaming hot body right in front of me. I FELT it with my own two hands”

 

“Man” Kuroo threw himself on the bed beside Kenma once again and hid his eyes with his free hand. He was still wet and his skin radiated a lot of warmth, which was because he took a very hot shower, probably.

“So, what DID you do? Please don’t tell me you seriously ran away to jerk off?”

 

“Of course NOT” Bokuto answered quickly and his voice sounded muffled all of a sudden. Kenma made a wild guess that he tried to bury his face in a piece of clothing. “Damn Konoha came in… Akaashi managed to turn away in time and pretend nothing happened. But I was FROZEN! I couldn’t move a muscle. I’m sure Konoha must think I’m a friggin PERVERT. Am I a pervert, Kuroo?”

“No you’re not a pervert.” Kuroo answered. Kenma noticed the very slight change in his voice. It was nothing like he talked most of the time, he actually sounded comforting and calm. It was a very nice sound he often used when they were alone, but Kenma witnessed him for the first time using it for another person.  
“Just calm down okay? So you were interrupted, but that doesn’t matter. What pretty boy did means that he isn’t turning you down and that’s a good thing”

  
“What… do I do now?” Bokuto’s muffled voice was hardly understandable through the fabric, but it definitely sounded truly clueless and not at all careless and light-hearted as most of the time.

 

“Honestly, I don’t know. What do you expect me to say? You were right, it is hard to believe what you just said and if I were in that kinda situation… damn I would fuck that guy right on the spot if I had the chance”

 

“Ew…”

 

Kuroo flinched at Kenma’s statement like he had forgotten about him sitting right next to him. He looked up with an embarrassed and at the same time almost apologetic gaze

“I ugh… didn’t mean that” he said awkwardly, but Kenma just shrugged and finally turned back to his game.

“Like I care”

 

“But Kuroo! What if I misinterpreted horribly?! What if my palms were sweaty? They must have felt disgusting! What if he felt disgusted? I bet he was disgusted! I’ll do horribly wrong with everything I do and he’ll think I’m disgusting and will never talk to me again! What if he hates meeee?!”

 

Kenma was actually amazed by the amount of _horrible’_ s and _disgusting’_ s Bokuto used in such a short time and he was sure Kuroo was about to tease him about it, but on the contrary he didn’t seem to be in a teasing mood.

“Wow Bo. Stop.” Kuroo sat up and his voice was serious, almost lecturing. “Did he seem disgusted, when you touched him?”

 

“No?... I guess” Bokuto answered hesitantly.

 

“See? He’s clearly not disgusted of you, so calm down. If it is true at all that he WANTED you to touch him, just go for it. You ask me what if everything is horrible? Well, let me ask you in return, what if it isn’t? What if you just missed an opportunity to get laid with the person you crushed so hard on for about I haven’t even counted the times you called or texted in the middle of the goddamn night. Have you ever thought about that?”

 

“No?”

 

“Of course you haven’t. Because you’re pessimistic as hell when it comes to romantic feelings. Listen up! Try to think about it like you think about volleyball. When someone tosses the ball for you… no, when _Akaashi_ tosses the ball, would you NOT go for it?”

 

“What? No! I’ll NEVER miss a toss from Akaashi!”

 

“Damn right! You just go for it. Akaashi tossed the ball for you right now, you just have to take the opportunity, do you get what I’m saying?” Kuroo exhaled and waited a second for Bokuto to say something, but the phone stayed silent “Well and IF you’ll fail horribly then I’ll carry the can for it, alright? But I swear to god – and Kenma here is my witness – If you give up now I’ll slap your owl-face until pretty boy can’t even recognize you anymore”

 

Kuroo clenched his fist on his knee and Kenma swallowed. He had quite a lot of experience to know that it would be no use to try to disagree with Kuroo when he was determined like that.

 

“Uhm… alright” Bokuto obviously admitted defeat, there was simply no cure for determined Kuroo.

“Now go home for gods sake. And never tell me about your masturbation habits again”

 

“Ok. Sorry dude, I just... panicked. See ya” Bokuto paused and before he hung up mumbled a small “Thank you”

 

**call ended…**

Kuroo groaned and exhaled audibly like every nerve just left his body. He sank back into the mattress and looked like he would fall asleep every second.

“I don’t want to be involved in this” Kenma raised his voice just so he could clarify that this whole conversation had nothing to do with him, even if he listened to everything. Dealing with other people was troublesome. Especially dealing with other people’s _romantic feelings_. Even if Kenma would have been close to Kuroo’s amount of generosity to offer his help, he had no experience with _feelings_ at all.

 

“Please, Kenma. Not now” Kuroo closed his eyes and rubbed his temples in soothing cycles “That just gave me a headache. Again”

 

“Why do you even listen to him when he’s annoying?”

 

“Because he’s a friend, I already told you. I can’t leave him hanging, I wouldn’t leave you hanging when you would have a crush on someone”

 

“I won’t”

 

“I mean IF you would. That’s what friends are for. Even when it’s fucking nerve-wrecking”

 

“I guess. But I won’t”

 

“Yeah yeah”

 

“I’m tired”

 

“Okay. I’ll go get the futon” Kuroo stood up and wobbled in the general direction of his wardrobe. Kenma’s eyes met his muscular back and he wondered if he wasn’t cold running around nearly naked and still wet from his probably early interrupted shower.

 

“It’s fine. I’ll sleep on the bed” Kenma mumbled, yawning and let himself slide to the side until he was lying and instantly closed his eyes. He didn’t plan to move until morning anyway, so why bother standing up just to curl up on a cold futon when he was already in bed. “Just try not to move so much in your sleep”

 

“Geez, at least put the console away before you fall asleep” Kuroo complained, but Kenma could hear the snicker in his voice. He snatched the PSP lying on the mattress right next to Kenma and put in on the nightstand before he wandered off to the bathroom once again to brush his teeth. Kenma had already done that after dinner, because he always hated the greasy feeling in his mouth after eating.

 

The room fell silent and he already drifted of in a slight slumber until he felt movement next to him ten minutes later. It wasn’t the first time they slept close to each other, not at all. They’ve done it countless times since kindergarten and it still kind of felt natural to do so. Kenma snuggled closer to the warm body next to him instinctively. It was simply comfortable and Kuroo never seemed to mind.

 

“Do you think it is possible for them to become a couple?”

Kuroo’s voice was calm and soothing, just like Kenma liked it the most. His hand found his way to Kenma’s head on his own and he started to gently scratch his scalp like he did countless times before. If felt relaxing and familiar.

 

“Mmh” Kenma only hummed as an answer, but it seemed to be enough anyway.  
  
“I do hope so. Bo deserves to be… _happy_ , you know? God I sound so cheesy” Kuroo’s chest vibrated because of the soundless chuckle he tried to prevent from escaping. Kenma smiled a barely noticeable smile, because it was cute. After that, a long pause happened and he almost thought that Kuroo simply stopped talking and went to sleep himself, but just as Kenma nearly drifted away again, he raised his voice once more.

 

“Do you think it’s weird? I mean, because they’re both guys”

 

It was the first time Kuroo asked something like that, even after talking about Bokuto’s crush countless times before. Kenma just figured Kuroo didn’t mind that his friend’s crush was actually a gay crush and quickly decided to also not pay attention to it. There was no reason to come up with it now and Kenma was too tired to think about one. Anyway there was a different sound to Kuroo’s voice, but this time Kenma wasn’t familiar with it at all. It was confusing, hearing a kind of voice from his childhood friend he never heard before.

“It doesn’t matter” Kenma answered. First, because he was sure that Kuroo wanted him to say that and second because it actually happened to be his honest opinion. “As long as they like each other, it doesn’t matter”

 

After the last words escaped his throat, he felt both his body and mind finally drifting into sleep. The warmth and the sensation from fingertips and just the right amount of scratches on his scalp were simply too comforting to stay awake. He felt Kuroo’s chest moving again and figured he said something else, but he was already gone. Maybe he’ll ask him about it tomorrow.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay, that's the part when I need to write "It's been several month, but I can explain" right? I can't. But I haven't given up just yet and there will be at least 3 more chapters to come!   
> But for now take this one and please continue to bear with me
> 
> I also have a new beta who's way more skillful with english than me! Thanks a lot for helping me

**From: stray bed-head-cat**  
to: Konoha   
Dude, you ran in on THAT yesterday didn’t you?

 

Konoha made a face after he read the message and was instantly reminded of the picture that was literally burned into his mind. The picture of his soon-to-be captain and unfortunately best friend sitting in their clubroom late at night with a very visible erection in his too tight white trainings shorts. Up to this day Konoha had never thought about those shorts being too tight, but now he knew they were. Too tight indeed, like, far too tight. He made a mental note to buy a new pair of shorts in a bigger size.

 

 **From: Konoha**  
to: stray bed-head-cat  
Fuck you

**From: stray-bed-head-cat**  
to: Konoha  
So it’s true? You have my pity dude. But could you really believe it? I’m still thinking Bo made it all up.  


**From: Konoha**  
to: stray bed-head-cat  
Made what up? What are you talking about? Do you really think I ASKED what happened after walking in on boner-Bo?? (I’m still not sure I want to know)

 

**From: stray-bed-head-cat  
to: Konoha**

Touché. I mean IF he told the truth, prettyboy was the one who made a move. Who would have thought that? Seems like we don’t have to help them at all

 

“What?” Konoha said out loud, because he actually never assumed it was Akaashi who did, well, _anything._ To be honest his best assumption was that Bokuto got hard by simply watching his teammate change or something.

**From: Konoha**  
to: stray bed-head-cat  
What? Wow okay. He didn’t seem like _that_ kinda guy

**From: stray-bed-head-cat  
to: Konoha**

You mean that kinda guy who’s into airheads?

 

**From: Konoha  
to: stray bed-head-cat**

I mean that kinda guy who’s gay

 

**From: stray-bed-head-cat  
to: Konoha**

Oh come on, don’t give me that. Don’t say you’re actually a homophobe, this ship has sailed some time ago.

 

**From: Konoha  
to: stray bed-head-cat**

I’m nothing like that

 

**From: stray-bed-head-cat  
to: Konoha**

Good, cause otherwise I’ll stand up right now and come over to punch you. Don’t forget that I absolutely know where you live!

 

**From: Konoha  
to: stray bed-head-cat**

Calm down, I’m not a homophobe ok?

 

**From: stray-bed-head-cat  
to: Konoha**

Of fucking course you’re not!

Tell me if anything else happens between them, got it? Bo WILL tell me anyway, but I wanna be sure he tells the truth.  


**From: Konoha**  
to: stray bed-head-cat  
Okay okay. But I’m NOT supervising any kind of kinky shit

 

**From: stray-bed-head-cat  
to: Konoha**

Especially the kinky shit! You need to tell me every detail, dumbass!

Konoha clicked his tongue as he read the last message Kuroo sent him. Of course he couldn’t be serious, but on the other hand it was Kuroo and one could never be 100% sure if he was serious or just joking.

Konoha wasn’t sure about being _that much_ involved in this whole situation. It was too late anyway, but he still felt damn awkward about it. He definitely wasn’t a homophobe at all, everyone should be allowed to hook up with whomever. But while the thought of one of his best friends having a guy-crush was weird but ok to live with, the thought of him actually getting together with another dude was pretty hard to get used to.

 

Over one week passed in a flash and Akaashi’s behavior was still a mystery to Konoha, so he soon figured that trying to understand what he was thinking was no use. Bokuto on the other side was open as a book. It was quite obvious that he WASN’T aware of Konoha and eventually quite a few of the other teammates watching the two of them or maybe he simply wasn’t bothered by it or interpreted it as another welcome act of appreciation. Anyway, Bokuto turned up at the very front of Akaashi’s classroom just the day after the incident at the clubroom. Konoha knew, because he vanished as soon as the bell rang and the news of that eye-catching second year appearing at the first year’s homeroom spread like wildfire. Aside from that, Konoha happened to know some people in Akaashi’s class and couldn’t resist asking if Bokuto’s appearance was as blunt as he imagined. Of course it was.

 

What he was told was the following: Bokuto of course looked ridiculous with his weird hairstyle and ears shining in a bright pink and his voice was so loud that the whole class listened to him announcing the wish to spend lunch break together with Akaashi. Of course people were staring and whispering at that moment, since Bokuto actually grew to be some sort school celebrity ever since he eventually became captain of the volleyball team and an astounding wing spiker ace on top of that. Just a few days ago a quite large number of students at Fukurodani appeared at a practice match to check and in the end cheer him on. Of course some of them also got to know about setter and vice-captain Akaashi, but most of the time everyone nearly vanished beside Bokuto’s appearance on the court.

In the end Akaashi actually spent lunch with Bokuto that day and the following and the one after that because he kept appearing in his doorframe only minutes after the bell rang. Ever since then, it kind of became a daily routine and Konoha became almost used to the fact that Bokuto’s voice simply disappeared from around the other second years.

 

“Bokuto sure spends a lot of time with Akaashi-san.” Komi stated one day at lunch break, throwing a knowing gaze in Konoha’s direction “It’s awfully quiet”

 

“Yeah, I can finally sleep in peace.” Konoha answered and yawned. He slept through lunch break most of time, or at least tried to sleep which was impossible while Bokuto’s words never stopped pouring out of him all the time. But since he started spending his free time with Akaashi it sure became quiet.

 

“It’s pretty boring, isn’t it?” Komi admitted a minute later “Do you think they _need_ to be all alone all the time?”

 

“Don’t ask me stuff like that.” Konoha quickly answered, rubbing his eyes as if he was awfully tired “I’m sure Bo is disgustingly happy.”

  
“Didn’t you say Kuroo asked you to keep an eye on them?” Komi chuckled when Konoha nearly flinched. He was still so easily embarrassed about that topic and Komi seemed to find a liking to tease him.   
  
“I don’t even know why I told you anything about that” Konoha groaned and started to feel bad about the fact that he was indeed asked to keep Kuroo up-to-date but hadn’t told him that Bokuto and Akaashi spent every lunch break with one another for almost two weeks. There wasn’t even a real reason to be honest, or maybe there was, because he was somewhat relieved about the fact that he didn’t have to bother with that whole topic when Bokuto was nowhere in direct sight. “Can we just not talk about that?”

  
“Fine” Komi shrugged “I’ll let you sleep. I’m just kind of curious, you know? About what they’re actually doing all the time. All alone. Without any surveillance.”

“Shuddup Komi!!”

“Fine”

 

There was silence once again and Konoha audibly sighed and closed his eyes. All this was bothersome and embarrassing and awkward and he absolutely didn’t think about what those two not-so-straight guys were doing every day. He never thought about that, not even once or twice or nearly every day since they started being out of sight. He would never think of his friends, his male friends, his male friend teammates kissing or anything only slightly related. Not at all. And he would continue not to think about that.

 

“Where’s Bokuto-san? Not here again?” Sarukui just entered the room with an arm full of sweet treats from a store nearby.

 

“Ugh” Konoha only growled and his forehead met the table with a thunk.

 

“And what’s wrong with _you_?”

 

“Leave me alone” Konoha’s muffles voice was hard to understand, but his annoyance obvious anyway.

 

“I guess he’s regretting his choice of being friends with us” Komi chuckled and stole two milkbreads out of Sarukui’s arms to throw one of them in Washio’s direction, who silently followed Sarukui with a (still slightly scary) envious expression on his face. He didn’t say a word, but caught it and nodded thankfully.

 

“Hey those were mine” Sarukui protested, but smiled his usual calm smile anyway

 

“Oh come on Saru, don’t be a meany” Komi snatched another piece of the packed sweets and balanced it on top of Konoha’s head who still pressed his forehead against his desk top “You bought them to share anyway.”

 

“I didn’t! They were all for me” Sarukui still insisted “So where is Bokuto?”

 

“Alone with our vice-captain, where else would he be?”

 

“Okay. Come on then. Get up Konoha” Sarukui announced and patted Konoha’s shoulder until he raised his head enough to glare at him and for the milk bread on his head to fall to the table.

 

“Where to?” Konoha asked without really meaning it, because of course he already knew the answer.

 

“Bringing Bokuto and Akaashi-san their share of sweets, of course”

 

*

 

At first, Konoha was scared. Ok maybe not exactly _scared_ but concerned to go find the two of them. Firstly because there still was a slight chance to catch them in the act of _something_ , considering Kuroo was right about Akaashi actually being into guys. Konoha was pretty sure that won’t happen, but to be honest he was also sure that Akaashi would never do something that causes Bo to _react_ on purpose, which happened anyway. So he already decided to not trust his own judgment one bit anymore.  
Secondly, he wasn’t alone. Komi being there didn’t seem like a problem, but Sarukui and Washio still had no idea about the whole thing. Sure, they weren’t exactly stupid or oblivious enough to not notice how lovesick their friend acted, but anyway leading them into whatever would happen made Konoha’s head spin.

When they finally found Bokuto and Akaashi at the roof of the school building, Konoha wasn’t able to hold in a sigh, because they were of course fully dressed and in the middle of an of course absolutely casual conversation and he felt really fucking stupid expecting anything else all of a sudden. On top of feeling stupid, he also felt the gaze of someone behind him, assumingly Washio who seemed to get suspicious of his weird behavior. Fortunately he didn’t say a thing, maybe because Konoha wasn’t suspicious enough yet or maybe because Washio didn’t talk very often in the first place, but Konoha was pretty happy about whatever it may be.

 

To be honest, it was fun. Spending time all together felt far more comfortable than he expected. He kind of expected it to be, well, awkward being around Akaashi outside of practice, but it wasn’t like that in the slightest. After only a few minutes sitting down besides them and sharing the sweets Sarukui had brought they started a conversation, which was pretty random but didn’t feel weird. The one year of age difference wasn’t all that present aside from their level of school-knowledge. Akaashi was not exactly talkative, but always considerate to listen. Konoha of course knew that already and wasn’t surprised even though he had never shown any special interest in their new regular setter.

 

Konoha himself was pretty quiet, slowly ate his lunch and tried to seem as tired as he used to be. In fact, he carefully observed Akaashi. His kindness and completely calm expression, his sharp ears and eyes, which caught and remembered every sentence he listened to. His stupidly soft fluffy curly hair, which looked so perfect without any effort at all, Konoha would bet on it. His frustratingly pretty face and long lashes he sure was born with. Konoha tried to imagine his parents and he was almost sure that at least one of them had to be damn model.

 

“AKAASHI!”

 

Everyone turned his head to Bokuto, who just suddenly raised his voice in a far too loud manner as if he wanted to announce something very important. Konoha flinched, because he didn’t realize that he totally forgot about Bokuto.  
  
“P-PLEASE GO ON A DATE WITH ME”

 

Konoha choked on his sandwich and began coughing. Washio simply stared at Bokuto with a confused expression and Sarukui’s everlasting smile vanished for a moment in the middle of his sentence. It seemed like everyone had already forgotten what they were talking about anyway.

  
“W-w-what the hell, Bo?” Konoha finally managed to say in a rasp voice between two coughs. “That’s not something you scream over the rooftops!”

Konoha couldn’t believe what was happening right then because hell, how was it even possible for Bokuto’s absolutely awful flirting skills to become even more blunt. He also never thought he would ask Akaashi out in the middle of lunch break, on top of the school building and in company of four of their friends of which two had no idea what was going on. On the other hand, maybe he should have expected exactly that.

And besides that, was Komi actually smiling?

 

The air around the six guys stood still, mainly because no one had an idea what to say or how to react. Bokuto sat cross-legged in front of Akaashi and his grip on his own knees was so tight his knuckles turned white. He stared at him with wide owlish eyes and Konoha wouldn’t be surprised if he even held his breath in anticipation.

 

“Bokuto-san,” Akaashi started and for some goddamned reason his voice STILL sounded calm.

 

“YES?” Bokuto’s voice was loud and sharp and fast, like he was going to burst every second.

 

“Are you sure you want to go out with me?”

 

“YES!!!” Bokuto leaned forward, slammed both his palms on his knees and bowed so deep his nose almost touched the ground “I really really really want to! SAY YES PLEASE”

 

“Okay”

 

“Eh?” Sarukui’s smile was back on his lips, but he still looked confused and slightly embarrassed. Washio somehow managed to turn his head in another direction as if the situation was none of his business at all, but had a slight blush on his cheeks.

Konoha actually couldn’t believe his ears. It wasn’t that he didn’t know about the complete lack of discretion sides Bokuto but this scene was just unreal. He didn’t even seem to care that the other guys were right next to them.

Also, were those actual tears in his eyes when he looked up from his ridiculous position on the ground?

 

“I’ll wait at the gate today after practice.” Akaashi said, seemingly not being bothered by the audience. “Don’t be late”

 

“OF COURSE!”

 

“Hahaha” Sarukui began to chuckle “You’re blushing Bokuto, that’s awfully cute”. Bokuto flinched like someone smacked him. It almost looked like he completely forgot about his friends until now and was reminded of their presence just then. “Wha-? I’m not”

 

“Cute? Or blushing?” Sarukui asked and smiled wider. Akaashi didn’t say another word and simply returned to being as passive as ever, but Konoha observed him sharply, because there HAD to be some kind of reaction on his face. There wasn’t, or he was far too talented to hide it and it was frustrating.

 

“Both!” Bokuto shouted and gestured wildly with both his hands.

 

“But you totally are.”

 

“Am not!”

 

“You’re still getting redder actually.” Sarukui laughed louder now and poked Bokuto’s obviously red cheek with his index finger “It’s rare to see our mighty Ace embarrassed”

 

“I’m not!!!”

 

The discussion went on until the bell rang. Konoha didn’t pay them much attention, because he still tried to figure out what Akaashi was thinking. As the bell stopped, the first year was the first one to actually stand up and grab his bag.

 

“I’m returning to class, then” Akaashi politely bowed to his seniors and Bokuto abruptly abandoned the ‘I’m not blushing’ discussion with Sarukui to send a blindingly bright smile to him.

 

“Alright!! We’ll see you at practice, Akaashiiieee! And after that our date will be AMAZING, I promise!!! It’ll be the BEST DATE EVER!!”

 

“I’ll see you later.” Akaashi simply answered, then turned around awfully quick to get off the roof. The others were waving him off, but Konoha straightforward _stared_ at him. Of course he kind of waited for an actual reaction to come, but when it came it caught him off guard. Because he just witnessed something he never expected to witness. In fact, it was the second thing today, because he sure as well never ever expected him to accept such a very bold invitation to a same-sex date. Right then when the first-year turned around and left, Konoha saw the so very pretty and so very calm and collected Akaashi with a face as red as a goddamn traffic light.

 

“Are you alright, Ko?” Komi’s hand on his shoulder brought him back to reality

  
“Ah... uh... yeah, sure” Konoha answered weirdly confused and Komi raised an eyebrow and for a moment Konoha wondered if he had just fantasized about Akaashi blushing like that. He quickly decided to not tell anyone just in case they’ll think he went nuts.

 

Bokuto jumped to his feet and every move he made was so full of energy and happiness that the other two couldn’t resist but tag along with his over enthusiastic mood.

“Let’s get going!! Come on, go go go! The faster we’ll finish class, the faster we’ll start practice!!”

 

“Haha alright, go ahead, Ace!” Sarukui instantly laughed and Bokuto nearly jumped ahead of the rest.

 

“That was… unexpected” Washio raised his deep voice for the first time since the embarrassing scene.

 

“Hell yeah it was” Konoha finally stood up last and stretched all of his limps with a groan “Who could have guessed Bo would be THAT blunt? Or wait… actually there was no way he would do it any other way possible”

 

“Are you implying you KNEW this would happen, Konoha-san?” Sarukui asked with a smile, but also his kind of tell-me-right-now voice.

 

“Uhm…” Konoha grinned awkwardly and scratched his chin “I maybe forgot to mention that. Komi and me formed an alliance with Kuroo from Nekoma”

 

“An _Alliance_?”

 

“To hook them up” Komi answered in Konoha’s stead and grinned brightly like a goddamn supernova.

 

“To hook them up? That’s just so like you”

 

“He looks happy” Washio stated, still watching Bokuto far ahead of them, who started to whistle a melody from some anime opening without a care in the world. There was no single trace of regret or dejection in his body language at all.

 

“He does” Sarukui nodded after he followed Washio’s gaze “It’s very nice to see”

 

“Such an airhead” Konoha said after he picked up both his own and Bokuto’s bag, which he of course forgot laying on the floor. For a second he wanted to yell at his friend for making him carry his stuff way too often, but swallowed the sentence because his cheeks actually began to hurt from smiling too wide. When did he even begin to smile?

 

Wordlessly, he raised a fist and received three similarly content fist-bumps.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading!   
> You can always shout at me about this fic or anything haikyuu related at einwegflasche on tumblr


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